Snow
by Localism
Summary: Craig moves back to South Park after a sever fever erases his childhood memories. What will he uncover when he returns? Will his nightmares subside? Author's note: Will become quite violent and sexual in nature. Mature content warning.
1. Moving to the Sound of an Indian Drum

**Author's note: This will be somewhat gory and violent in nature, in the future there are many different forms of violence incorporated into the story, including rape or molestation. I'm not sure where this story is going right now, to be honest, I'm just opening my readers up to the possibilities. I would also like to thank you for giving my fanfiction a look, please leave a review or favorite to encourage me to continue.**

**This is the shortest chapter of the series, so bear with me, it gets better. I've revised this chapter, making it longer and including some important information.**

_Is it really necessary? Living, I mean._

_Why do I care?_

_.. Do I really care?_

I ask myself questions all the time. I can sit in my room for hours, no music, no television. Just me, my thoughts and the white ceiling above me. I love my own company, that's one quality I appreciate about myself. The reason I love my own company is because I know myself so well. When I'm alone in my room having silent conversations to myself, it's as if I'm talking to my best friend. Closer than a best friend, maybe. I think the difference is that when you tell a friend something in confidence, there is always a hint of doubt that it will be kept in private. Everything I think about stays in my head, things that only I will ever know about me.

I had a feeling things were being kept from me sometimes. Often, when I walk into the kitchen, my mom is doing dishes, but she's just staring out the window, like someone froze her in place. My mother never really was happy in Miami, but some of her behavior could never be explained just by unhappiness. There were times I'd walk into my parent's bedroom and see her lying flat on her back, in her bed, staring straight up at the ceiling, as if she were in a trance.

You know, sometimes I picture that I killed myself just to imagine the reactions of my mother, father and other loved ones. Not because I enjoy their reaction, but because realizing how much they would hurt keeps me from putting a gun to my head. I'm selfless that way, that's another good thing about me. I care about how I make other people feel. Well, at least those I love.

Love; that's another subject I've been meaning to touch on. Why don't I have a crush on anyone? Why haven't I ever had a girlfriend, or any significant other at all? I guess it may have something to do with my lack of interest in anything, generally. That's just speculation like anything else going though my head. Don't get me wrong, there was a time in my life that I tried to force myself to be interested in dating. It was only after I discovered my friends were dating and I believed I was abnormal in some way, however. I just didn't want anyone to think something was wrong with me. Drawing attention to myself is simply something I don't like to do. I want to be far from the spotlight in any way I can.

I find myself spending more and more time in my room, lately. When I started high school, which is as far back as I can remember (aside from a few fleeting memories), I had quite a few friends. I spent time with them frequently, despite not knowing them for a very long time. You see, my mother and father moved here to Miami not long after I woke from a childhood coma. They never did say much about it, they just told me I fell ill and my fever escalated to a point that my brain couldn't handle it. Like a computer overheating. From what I understand, we used to live in a town by the name of South Park. They never told me our reasons for leaving, only that I had so much memory damage that they wanted to avoid any pressure to remember from my peers. My friends and I distanced after Sophomore year.

I can't explain why, but when I was sixteen, I entered some sort of existential crisis. I guess anyone would really say that losing faith in your beliefs and questioning your life, friends and family are a normal part of being a teenager and growing up. The difference was that I slept for hours on end, to the point that it worried my family, for an entire summer. I slept fourteen to sixteen hours every day, and when I woke up I ate and showered, nothing else. I barely left the house for nearly three months. There were times late at night, that I woke in fear, seeing creatures grabbing my legs from beneath my bed. A few moments later they would be gone, but the fear remained. I remember a couple of nights I brought my blankets upstairs and slept on the floor at the side of my parents bed. It felt childish, but I preferred to be immature than being scared out of my mind.

Needless to say, I've had trouble in my life. After this period of endless sleep, I woke to find that I was an entirely different person. I was less interested in my friends and more interested in myself. I went from being hateful and mean to simply being less interested and more secluded. I still have nightmares at times, but I don't sleep nearly as much and I am doing quite well in school. There has been talk of moving back to South Park, but it doesn't seem like my parents are sure. I don't really feel that moving at this time in my life is a good idea, but I have little control over the situation.

For some reason, I get the feeling that all of this is going to go horribly wrong in some way. Without really understanding why, I dreaded the idea of South Park. My mom told me that there was a lot of snow, and anyone else who had never seen snow before would be excited, but the thought of it just made me sick to my stomach. I can't explain why, but I just knew that something was wrong, with me and with my parents. Something was off, something was fake, and South Park was going to reveal what exactly was giving me that feeling. Intensely, I felt the tresses, the torture of snow.

It was as if my demise had been written in the stars, and that the move to South Park was going to be the beginning of my downfall. I could feel it creeping up my back and along my spine, like a centipede.


	2. The Fright of the Scarlet Light

_My eyes were shut. I could smell cleaning products, new platic and rubber. The strong, almost sickening scent of new platic. The scent was so pungent that I could nearly taste it. I heard beeping, rustling outside of the room and shuffling of papers. Footsteps, clicking heels reverbarated through the hall. I moved my hand slightly and felt crisp, cheap sheets draped over me. They weren't soft, just cold and stiff as if they had been folded up and left in someone's attic for years. My eyes felt heavy, but I could tell that there was a light on, even through my eyelids. It was bright and hard, I'd even say it made my head hurt if it weren't for the knocking and beating already taking place. With every pulse of my heart, there was pain all the way through my body. The more aware I became, the more pain I felt. My hands hurt, my legs hurt, even my back hurt. It wasn't an unbearable pain, just a dull ache._

_When I finally gathered myself enough to open my eyes, there was nothing but darkness. The beeping had halted and the smell of plastic and rubber had long gone, I barely remembered it now. I was looking up at the sky, it was clear and the stars were easily seen. I couldn't be in Miami, for the city lights would be far too bright to be able to see the stars so clear as they were. The air was brisk and cold. You may never believe that ice had a scent, but the only way to describe the smell of the air was to call it frozen. Having been in Florida for most of the life I remember, the smell of the cold air was new, yet somehow familiar._

_I moved my hand and found that it was gloved, then realized that the constriction around my chest was a coat. I could hear the padded insides of it move around as I took a deep breath. I wasn't in pain anymore. I sat up and put my hand on my head. There was a hat. I took it off of my head slowly and looked at it. It was blue with ear flaps and head a yellow ball sewn to the top of it. I looked down to see that it matched my coat perfectly. The same shade of blue. Having lived in a warm-weather climate for most of my life, I've never owned a coat, only a few jackets for the mildly cold winters of Florida. I don't recall ever owning this coat at all, but I'm thankful I have it in this cold weather._

_Suddenly I was shaken by this horrible scream. I covered my ears, but the volume didn't change. When it stopped, I uncovered my ears and looked around, but all I could see was snow and the silhouette of trees. Another shrill scream followed, I closed my eyes tightly and held my head, but again the volume of the shriek didn't change. I quickly got up on my feet and began to run, hoping that maybe the scream would go away._

_My head was still spinning because I had gotten up too quickly. I was looking behind me, as if I was being followed by some sort of apparition, when I ran into something hard and wooden. I fell backward into the snow and held my head in pain. I took my hand from my head and looked down to see that my glove was covered in blood. I then looked from my hand to the small, wooden shack that was inches from my feet. It was old and rickety, windows broken and pieces of wood missing from the walls. There was water damage so significant that it was surprising the building was still standing at all._

_Another shriek was heard, only this time it was farther in the distance. I ran into the hole in the front of the shed and I looked around. There was tools hanging from the ceiling, rusted and overgrown with some kind of vine-like plant. There was almost no floor, just creeping shrub and dirt. I looked for somewhere, anywhere to hide. I pulled myself under a low, wooden counter attached to the wall and knocked some old boxes over to conceal myself. I looked through a small hole between the mushy cardboardm mess I had used for cover, but I could only see the dirt flooring. A few minutes later there was brief talking outside._

_"- ..Did he run off to? .." One voice said._

_"- ..Better keep his mouth- .." Another muttered._

_I could hear footsteps in the room, I could see the floor, but where the footsteps seemed to be, there were no feet. It was as if the noise were created by a ghost or spirit. Eventually the footsteps left and I was sitting there, rocking back and fourth._

_With everything going on, all I could think to myself was that I had been here before._

I woke, feeling fatigued and scared. My heart was nearly beating out of my chest, as I shot up into a sitting position.

That felt so real.

I wasn't sure what that was, or why it felt so real, but I knew one thing was certain.. I could never return to South Park. I knew that this particular dream had a meaning, it had a reason, a forshadowing.

I ran down the stairs, it was morning. My mom was doing dishes, my father at the table reading the Sunday paper. It was exceptionally cold in our house, my parents kept the air on high, because of the horribly high temperatures of Florida during the summer. Normally this wouldn't phase me, but after the nightmare, the cold sunk straight to my bones. My parents could never stand the heat here.

"Good morning, sweetie." My mother cooed with usual kindness.

I cocked my head and squinted my eyes. Why was she being so nice to me? She rarely greeted me in the morning, nor was she normally up this early to begin with.

".. Morning." I said stiffly, going to the fridge and pouring a glass of orange juice.

I didn't realize how thirsty I was until the glass hit my lips. I chugged the glass, then nearly knocked over the half gallon of juice when I picked it up and desperately drank the rest of it. By the time I finished and set the empty container on the counter, my mother and father were both staring at me, worried expressions on their faces. I shrugged it off, looking down at my shirt. I had large, sweaty stains as if I had run a marathon.

"Are you okay, Craig?" My mom said, leaning over and putting a hand on my forehead, "You're burning up, I mean, look at you."

She gestured to the stains on my shirt and the empty jug of orange juice.

"I'm fine, mom. Really." I said, avoiding eye contact with her. I actually didn't feel fine at all. I felt like I'd been hit by a bus.

She looked at my dad and he shrugged at her, which gave me some relief. Usually when my dad decided to drop something, my mother followed. I sat at the table and ate some toast, everything was quiet fr a few minutes.

"Son," My father started sternly, "Your mother and I have some important news, and I don't want you to argue with the choice we've made. It wasn't easy for us."

I turned toward him so fast I heard my neck pop and cringed a bit, rubbing it with my hand. Oh no. No, no, no.

"We're moving back to South Park."


	3. Lilith Just Wants to Dance

We were on our way to South Park. It was going to be a long car ride, but my parents said we wouldn't be staying at a hotel. I argued that driving for almost a day straight was reckless and dangerous, but I only got reprimanded for being a "smart mouth." I don't understand why they just can't listen. It had only been two weeks since my parents had decided to move and I was still a little put-off about not getting ample time to say my good-byes to my friends. I had known them for three years, after all. I guess I just thought my parents would care more about they life they brought me into. They seemed so quiet lately, I had barely heard a word from them. My mom, who was typically on my ass about everything I did, where I went or if I was eating properly had barely cared enough to peek in on me and see if I was home or not. I just figured they were too busy packing, it did only take them two weeks to get it done, after all.

It felt like it had been hours since we left the house, but to my disappointment, the car's digital clock said it had only been about forty-five minutes. What a damn drag. By that time I wished I had brought my MP3 player or something to do. I guess I'm not very good at planning ahead. The only thing I could think to do was sleep, but the chatter from my parents and the blaring of horrible old-age country music was enough to keep that from happening. I would just have to wait until I was too tired to stay up, or until they quieted down.

The ride actually ended up not being that bad once my parents stopped ignoring my existence and we starting a good conversation. Time went by significantly faster that way. We talking about South Park, people we used to know and the house we used to live in. My mother told me that moving back to South Park might be good for me, maybe it will stir up some memories I lost in the past. Apparently the main reason my parents decided to move back is because the old couple who moved into our house after we left had passed away and we had a chance to move back into it. I guess South Park wasn't the same to my parents if they had to live in a different house, or maybe that was the only house in town that felt like home. I didn't ask their motives. I was fearful, but hopeful that this move would turn out to be good for me. At this point, I had convinced myself that the nightmares I had were just my mind playing tricks on me and playing up my anxiety about moving. I had to try to make the best of this.

When we arrived, it wasn't what I thought it would be. Unlike Miami, no one was outside. Everything was just kind of dead, to be honest. The only exciting thing about the place was the snow, but that was really only because I had never seen it before. We pulled into the driveway of the old house and I glanced over at the house. It wasn't big, nor small. It was really average, but my parents told me it was comfortable. I sat in the car staring up at it for awhile, even after my parents had left the truck and began moving the essentials into the house.

Suddenly I felt as though I was having an out-of-body experience. I was no longer in the car, just standing outside of the house. I heard kids playing in the street when only a few moments ago, everything was silent. Their echoes reverberated off of every building, stop sign and what felt like the insides of my head. I walked up to the house, only there was no snow on the ground anymore. Everything had some sort of a gray tint to it. Almost as if I had entered an old, faded photograph. I looked up at the windows of the house, and in one, I saw a telescope that I recognized as mine. I walked up the sidewalk and looked down at the cracks, even those looked familiar to me. I walked up to the door and turned the handle-

"Craig? Come on, honey, let's go. You have to help me carry this TV." His mom ripped him out of his daydream and into the real world.

I had still been sitting in the car.

With my mind still not in the right place, I picked up the box next to me in the seat and exited the car. I closed the door, looking up at the house and getting a strange deja vu kind of feeling. I walked up the sidewalk slowly, looking up at the window on the upper left side of the house. There was no longer a telescope there, but from the angle I stood it was identical otherwise. I looked down at the sidewalk to see the cracks were the exact same as I had daydreamed a few minutes ago. I understood why, I used to live here, but the feeling of remembering what I couldn't remember was haunting. At this point, I was quite afraid to enter the house, it had already been so draining already. Just from what I now felt, I was fatigued and wanted to sleep. I considred telling my parents I was uncomfortable and needed a little more time to adjust to the move back, but I didn't want to consern them. They were having a hard enough time unpacking as it is. With this, I sucked it up and headed for the propped-open front door of the house.

My mom walked out to get another box and gave me a worried look, "Are you okay, Craig?"

"Yeah, I just.. Well, I remember a few things about this house, that's all." I said slowly and quietly, continuing to walk toward the front door.

I could see her stop and stare at me for a moment out of my pereferal vision. Shortly after, I could hear her footsteps heading toward the car. I reached the front door and  
>took a few anxious breaths. Part of me expected some sort of flashback, another daydream, but I exhaled and stepped in. Nothing so far. In fact, I didn't really remember the<br>living room of the house at all. I looked around. There was a staircase to my right and a door, presumably a closet or a bathroom. Ahead of me, I could see a kitchen and another door which I got a feeling that it was a stairwell to the basement. I just kind of stood there for a second.

I got a brief deja vu feeling, I could see green and white plaid curtains above the kitchen window and a light brown old-style table and one chair close enough to the walkway that I could see it. In a flash, they were gone and the room was bare, only a few boxes littered on the floor and counter. My mom nearly ran into me, since I was still standing in the doorway. She gave me a disappointed look and grunted for me to move. It took a minute for my feet to move, but I made my way toward the staircase. I looked down at the steps to find that I had gone up them numerous times. I had looked at that was millions of times. I had heard my parents conversation from the kitchen more times than I could count. Even the smell of the wood and dust was familiar, almost suffocatingly familiar, in fact. I took a few steps up the staircase and expected the fourth one to creek. It did. After that, I realized that my brain wasn't making all of this up from fear. Without initially knowing it, I had been doubting that I remembered these things entirely and that perhaps my imagination was getting the best of me. For the majority of the time we unpacked, I found myself giving my brain tests. What's behind which door, what did the tile in the bathroom look like, things like that. I was hit and miss on a lot of them, but some things were unmistakable.

Eventually we made our way into the back of the moving truck where mine and my parents things were. They told me before we got here that I got to pick my room, since they were all equally sized, so before I went out to the moving truck, I made my way up the staircase again and I stopped at the top of it, warily. There was a window at the top of the stairs, which I had seen before, but beyond that was uncharted territory. I took a step in the direction of the three bedrooms, two doors on each side. One must be a bathroom or closet. I looked in the first door on the right and saw that it was a medium-sized bathroom. I looked into the doorward to the immediate left and saw a bedroom with wood flooring, but for some reason I kept wanting to say it used to have pink carpeting. I walked a bit further and there was another door on the right. I looked in and saw more wood flooring, I recognized this room as my parents bedroom. That meant the last room had to be mine. I walked a few feet further to the last door on the left and turned to look into the room.

The first thing I saw was a window, which I remembered very well. I used to spend hours in front of it, that I knew. My bed used to be to the right, my headboard against the wall the door was on. I used to have a poster in front of my bed next to the window, the tape stains still remained on the wall in an off-white kind of yellow. I had a telescope in front of the window. There was a closet on the left, but the door was no longer on it. Wait, there was never a door on that closet.. Was there? I couldn't quite recall. All I knew was that this was my room.

"Honey?" My mom asked, making me jump out of my skin. I had been so wrapped up in the room that I didn't hear her come up the stairs.

By the way my head snapped toward her, she jumped back a bit, realizing she had interrupted something. She put a hand on my shoulder, awkwardly.

"Yes, Craig. This was your room." She said quietly.

I already knew that it was, but it was still nice to have the confirmation. I walked past her, giving her a weak smile. It's time to start unpacking now.


	4. That which Holds, Won't Carry

Author's note: Again, I will remind you before it happens that there will be some extremely graphic material coming up. I've decided that it will involve rape, because it is an important part of the story line. It took me awhile to make this choice, but I feel it is the best for this story. If the idea of rape or child molestation is too much for you to handle, please leave immediately. Thank you.

In this chapter, I've given Clyde's little sister a name, since she was left unnamed by the creators of South Park. I do not claim to own this character or any of the others. Her name is going to be Tonya. Craig's father, previously unnamed, is Pete. His mother, Rosa. (Although his mother's name isn't used in this chapter.)

Besides that, I appreciate the reviews and messages I've recieved from this story so far. Keep up the encouragement!

It had been a few days since we moved to South Park. It was now August, before school started, and I was starting to enjoy myself. I had spent some time alone in my room and set everything up the way I liked it. Strangely I kept wanting to put items in the places I remembered them being before, maybe to make my memories more real. I just had this craving, this need, to make my memories real, to have some sort of closure. I was having a hard time understanding why it was that I needed closure, why I had this urge to recreate and repeat things I remembered. I just had this unsettling, sick sort of sad feeling. Something was wrong.

I sat in my room, looking out my window at the street. I did this all day yesterday and the day before, writing while I looked out. I noticed a few kids that appeared to be my age outside, a few of them looked at my house or paused as they walked by, talking to their friends. One or two of them I felt that I had seen before, but it had been five years since I lived here, so I couldn't be sure. After awhile, I saw a car pull up and a small family, two parents, a boy my age and a small girl hop out of the car. I got a little anxious, we hadn't had any visitors yet and I wasn't quite as settled as I'd liked to have been. It was happened whether I was ready or not, and I knew I would be involved in the welcoming. I started down the hall before my name was even called and by the time I got to the stairs, I could hear my mothers voice. I looked down the staircase and saw her hugging the other woman.

"Oh Betsy, it's been so long." I heard my mother say. They must have known this family before we left.

"Roger." My dad nodded and shook the man's hand.

"Pete." The man I now knew as Roger returned, a smile on his face, grabbing my father's handwith both hands and giving him a soft pat on the shoulder.

"Craig, come on down." She said, looking up the stairs at me. She must have heard my footsteps.

I walked down the stairs, examining the four of them. The boy my age had brown hair and wore a red sweater. The girl who appeared to be about fifteen had light brown hair  
>and wore a pink coat and jeans. I got to the bottom of the stairs and paused. They all looked at me, as if waiting for me to say something.<p>

"Hello, I- um. I'm Craig?" I said, more of a question, because they looked to be expecting something from me.

I held out my hand to the boy my age and he has this disappointed frown on his face, but he took my hand and shook at strongly.

"I'm Clyde, we used to be best friends.." He said with a sort of sad and uncomfortable tone.

"I'm sorry, I just don't remember.." I found it odd that I didn't remember him if we were best friends when I remembered so many other things. I felt like I had never seen this guy before in my life. I did feel bad though, and I wanted to put his discomfort at ease, "But I would like to get to know you and maybe be friends."

A small smile formed on his face and he nodded, then stepped back to where he stood before, next to the girl who I assumed was his sister. There was a few moments of awkward silence and we all stood there looking at each other.

"Well, I made some caserol if you're interested, you're welcome to stay and visit as long as you'd like." My mother said, trying to fill the gap between conversations.

"Oh, we'd love to! This will give us a chance to catch up on some lost time. Absolutely." The woman said, looking back at her family for approval, they all nodded.

We all made our way into the kitchen and sat at the table, my mother lagged behind and talked to the other woman for a few minutes. The kitchen still looked wrong to me. We now had striped cutains and a metal and glass table that was mch bigger than the one I remembered. I suppose my mom and dad had gotten better jobs since and had furthered their education. I couldn't help but feel a little annoyed by it, but I was sure the annoyance would eventually pass. My mother and Betsy entered the room after a few minutes and sat at the table.

"The caserole still has a few minutes left, but theres a pitcher of water on the table and some buns, you can help yourself." My mom said politely. I guess she had planned for company and just hadn't told me.

After a few minutes of uninteresting chit-chat my mother got up and took the caserole out of the oven. I noticed something about Clyde and the small girl I now knew as Tonya made me uncomfortable. They seemed a lot closer than I could imagine a brother and sister being. Then again, I was an only child, so I guess I wouldn't know. I ended up just blowing it off, even though it made me uneasy. Throughout dinner we talked about a lot of things. We talked about a girl who used to live in South Park disappearing the year we moved and my parents admitted they hadn't mentioned it to me. They didn't figure I'd remember anyway. I got the feeling from their tones that they were keeping something from me, but I didn't figure it was too significant. They were probably just overreacting, which was normal.

Dinner went by pretty quickly, really. My parents did a lot of catching up and Clyde and I had some idle conversation. We actually had a lot in common. We liked the same kinds of music, the same videogames and other things kids our age did. He told me a lot of things we both liked we did when we were kids. He even mentioned that we both did a lot of stargazing through my telescope when I lived here, which had to be true, because I never mentioned owning a telescope. I felt a little left out, otherwise. Like I had just transferred from another planet. There were so many things I never knew. I never knew my mom was into Jazz, or that she tap-danced. I never knew my dad hunted and that he once earned a reward for donating deer meat to a food-for-kids organization. I never would have guess my parents were interesting at all, or that they did anything other than work. Besty talked to my mom about joining tap-dancing again, my mom agreed it would be a great idea. Things seemed like they were looking up. I was happy to see my parents so.. Calm. They never looked like they were having fun, it was almost as if they belonged here.

After we all said our goodbyes, I said goodnight to my parents and headed up to my room. I took a shower and went to bed, feeling quite peaceful.

**_I heard laughing, little girls laughing. I opened my eyes and I was in my bed, only I didn't feel quite like myself. I must have just woken up, I was groggy, the sun was bright, shining through my window. I lay there for a moment. I realized a few things were a little off. My room was how I remembered it from years before. There was a poster in front of my bed, an astronomy poster with the Orion constellation. I looked up at my ceiling to see that there were glow-in-the-dark stars and rocket ships. I sat up in my bed, still not completely awake. There was a blue rug on my floor that I didn't remember. My closet had a door. I looked down and saw that my blankets were blue with green stars, instead of my normal blue and gray plaid blankets._**

**_I uncovered myself and saw that I wasn't wearing my normal pajama pants and t-shirt. I was wearing children's pajamas, speckled with stars and rocket ships. I got up from the bed, feeling a little dizzy and walked down the hall, which seemed unusually long, to the bathroom. I looked in the mirror to find that I was younger. Much younger. Twelve or thirteen-years-old. I had messy, short brown hair when mine was nearly ear-length now. I heard the laughter again and walked out of the bathroom and rushed down the stairs. I was unsettled by the laughter, because it sounded like it was coming from inside my own head. I ran to the kitchen by instinct and looked out the back window to see two girls. One was Tonya, who I had met the night before, and another girl who had long, strawberry-blonde hair. They were skipping rope, singing and laughing, their hair flowing in the sunlight. Their laughter burned my ears and made my head hurt. I closed my eyes tightly in an attempt to stop the aching, but when I opened them, the laughter stopped. The girls were gone. Suddenly I felt a hard burning in my hand and opened it quickly. I heard something drop to the floor. I looked down to see two hair bands._**

**_My vision suddenly stopped, everything was black and I heard horrible, loud screaming. Shrill, desperate shrieks. I heard them being muffled, I heard a few thuds and _**  
><strong><em>suddenly everything went quiet.<em>**

**_And what sounded seperately, was horrible, perverted whispering. Distortend and rushed, quiet whispering._**

**_"Come on baby, you want to, I know you want to. Come on. Come on, don't fight, baby."_**

I woke up in a hot sweat, I felt so overheated, my head was beating with my pulse and I felt myself lean over the bed quickly. I couldn't breath, my chest was burning. I saw a light come on and my mom ran into the room.

"Craig? Craig, what's wrong?" My mom asked, hushed. She turned on a light, "My God, Craig, what's wrong with you?"

I opened my eyes and looked at her confused, then I looked at the floor and saw that I had thrown up. I shook my head.

"I'm-" My throat hurt so bad I couldn't talk. My mouth was dry. "Hot. Water."

She quickly went down the stairs and walked back in my room with a glass of water, which I drank within three seconds and set next to me on my nightstand. I brought my knees up to my chest and looked at her. She seemed to be waiting for me to say something.

"I'm-" I started.

"Do you need to go to the hospital, Craig?" She asked worriedly.

I shook my head, "No, I'm fine. I just had a bad dream. I got too hot. Just go back to bed."

She cleaned up the mess I had made, which I felt bad about, but let her. I would have helped, but I had this weak feeling in my legs. I had to assure her a few times that I was okay, but she eventually shut off my light and left. When she did, I closed my door and flipped the light back on, stood on my bed and examined my ceiling. When I looked closely, I could see a pattern of stars outlined in a light, off-white. This was real. I lie in bed for hours wondering what all of this meant. Needless to say, I lost a lot of sleep that night.


	5. Education of the Loch Ness

Locker G268. Simple enough.

I walked down the hallways of the high school, which was kind of a relief. Not a relief because it was easy, but because it was a place I knew I had never been before. I couldn't have any recollection of it. I wasn't afraid to explore. I didn't recognize many faces and the ones I did recognize, they didn't seem to really pay a mind to me. Being my senior year, most everyone was younger than me. It was a small high school, much smaller than the one I went to before, and it was kind of a nice break. It was nice that no one really knew me, or at least didn't recognize me at first. Typically most high school were a collection of grade schools, but South Park was in the mountains and there really were no other grade schools nearby. This meant that the classes were the same size they were in grad eschool. The way it worked was that there were many teachers, all equipped to teach one subject to multiple grades at multiple levels. We had transition periods like any high school where we would change classes, the only difference was that in each class, freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors, only had around twenty-four to thirty students. All seniors had English for their first hour on Monday.

I decided, after a brief visit to my locker to make sure it would open with my combination, that it was time to head to my first hour class. I was a little anxious about being with a group of people who probably knew more about me than I did, since they remembered a longer period of my life. I wondered who Clyde had talked to about my returning, or if anyone would remember who I was. I walked down the hall a bit further and got to the classroom printed on my schedule. I double checked the room number to make sure I wasn't going to embarrass myself by walking into the wrong class, and then headed in. I didn't take time to look at any of the faces, I just looked at the seats until I found an empty one and then sat down.

"Craig, is that you?" I heard a voice and turned in the direction of it.

I saw a boy with black hair and a boy with red, flipping hair and wasn't sure who had said my name.

"Um. Yes, I am Craig. Who are you?" I asked, slightly recognizing the boy with black hair. I was a little surprised at how much my voice resembled a robot at this point.

They looked at each other and muttered something about memory loss and then back at me, "I'm Stan and this is Kyle. We heard you moved back, we weren't sure you would remember us or not, but I guess you don't."

He held out his hand and I shook it with a smile. They seemed pretty friendly, much more friendly than Clyde when I met him. I guess it just didn't feel like they had any reservations about getting to know me, they just seemed like a couple of open and honest guys. I got the feeling I never really spent a lot of time with them, I think that's why I was so uncomfortable around Clyde. Clyde and I had a lot of history I didn't remember, but I didn't feel that same pressure in this situation. I looked behind them and saw a boy with blonde hair who was talking to another boy with blonde hair, and next to them a bigger guy my age with light brown hair. The boy I knew as Stan looked behind him where my gaze was.

"Oh, this is Kenny, that little guy right there is Butters and that asshole is Cartman. Or Eric, but we just call him Cartman." He explained.

I turned around with a smile. This might not be the kids I hung out with before, but I had a feeling I would get to know them pretty well. As the class continued to talk, I looked around the room to get a feel for things. It wasn't a horribly clean classroom, so I assumed they weren't as strict as most high schools here. I saw "TINLEY" scrawled on the chalkboard and wondered if it was a male or female teacher. I kind of hoped it would be a female teacher, women always tended to make me feel more comfortable. I heard a lot of weird background conversation, just teen grumble about nonsense or some strange sexual stuff that I heard all the time in my old school. There was still five minutes left until class officially started, but I heard someone grumble about the teacher always being late, so I knew I had a bit. I slumped down in my chair and took out a notepad and started writing. Eventually I heard the classroom door shut and looked up to see a very rushed female. She had long brown hair and this nervous expression.

"Phew. Okay, class. For those of you who don't know already, I'm Miss Tinley. I'll be your English teacher this year.. And have been for every other year." She said, laughing at her own joke, but not earning any laughter from the class.

Everyone got quiet upon her entrance, so despite her unorganized and shy appearance, she must have earned their respect in some way. Perhaps it was just because they had known her all through high school, who knows. She spent the majority of the first class introducing the rules and projects for the semester. Now everyone was taking turns standing up and saying their name, accompanied by one fact about them. Everyone was kind of joking around about it since they had known each other from grade school. At one point Miss Tinley scolded someone for cussing, but otherwise things were going pretty smoothly. When it came to be my turn, everyone got a little quiet and looked at me. I stood up, feeling like I was on the spot.

"Hi, um. I'm Craig Tucker." I said, a few people were examining me closely, "I used to live here, but I suffered severe memory loss and I don't remember much of it."

After that it felt like the fun kind of ended, but I was the second to last person to go aside from the Butters kid no one seemed to pay attention to, so I didn't feel too bad. It gave Miss Tinley a chance to start on a new topic while everyone was calm, as well. She started talking about the gradescale and what constitutes as a passing grade, what a failing grade percentage was, yadda yadda. She handed out our textbooks and by the time she recorded what number book we all had, it was about time for class to be over. Being the nice lady she was, she let everyone talk until the bell rang. I found myself caught up in a conversation with Kyle about the lack of respect Cartman gives him on a daily basis. Well, it was more of a one-sided conversation, but I didn't mind listening. It was, after all, something I'm good at.

That day, we had three other classes. Our classes alternated every other day. Today I had English, Mathematics, physical Science and House and Home. Tomorrow I had History, Computer Technology, philosophy and mechanics. The day had gone by smoothly and I made it to my last period with little to no discomfort in any way. The first day in house and home, we went over basic cooking safety and we were given partners to come up with a recipe to try over the school year. It wasn't due until second semester, so we had a lot of times, but we were expected to perfect all of the formulas and measurements. Not allowed to look it up online, unfortunately. It had to be somewhat original. So we would need that time. I was paired up with Stan, Kyle was paired up with this kid named Token. Kenny with Butters, Cartman with a kid named Tweek. Clyde was paired up with a kid I didn't recognize and I didn't happen to hear his name in class. It had been decided, without me, that we would take turns pairing up in fours to brainstorm. Not that I minded, I just kind of felt left out of the group decisions because no one knew me.

After school, I exchanged numbers with Stan and he said he would get a hold of me. I started walking home and I was joined by Clyde, he jogged a bit to catch up with me.

"Hey Craig, where are you off to?" He asked me, catching his breath a little.

"Oh, just headed home. I was going to look up some things for the project and finish my math homework." I answered honestly. I was pretty boring.

He nodded and walked with me. We had some idle conversation about the teachers, which ones were crazy and who I would be meeting in my alternate classes tomorrow. To tell you the truth, I wasn't really worried at all about the next day and I think he knew that. He was just looking for a reason to talk to me, which I understood. He was probably trying to search for something he saw in me before, or maybe he saw something that was a remnant of the past that made him curious. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but there was something.. Off. About Clyde. The way he stared at me, and I think he talked about me to other people. Not negatively or anything, but talking about me at all after we hadn't seen each other in so many years was sort of awkward to me. I mean, why did he care so much?

Eventually we reached our houses and went our separate ways. I walked in my house and turned on the living room light. I guess my mom and dad are either asleep or not home. I kind of needed the alone time after having a long day around my peers. I walked up to my room and plopped down in my chair, looking out the window. I grabbed my laptop and started Googling what flavors went well together, how much baking soda is required for the usual recipe. Before too long I found myself dozing off, so I set my laptop on my desk and I fell asleep on my bed for awhile.

I woke up a couple hours later to my cellphone ringing, I answered it.

"Hello?" I asked, my voice groggy.

"Hey Craig, it's Stan. Did I wake you up or something?" He asked, sounding confused about my sleeping so early in the day.

"Yeah, but I was just taking a nap, it's cool. What's up?" I continued.

"Oh, I just wanted to let you know that we'll all be going to Kenny's house tomorrow. I know you don't know him very well, but he's the only kid with parents that won't be up our asses." He eleborated.

"Ah, alright. It will be cool to get to know him better anyway." I said in return.

We said our goodbyes and hung up. I would never admit it out loud, but I was really excited about hanging out with them, even if it was just for a school project. It had been awhile since I met anyone new, in Miami I always hung out with his same few friends, despite the large number of peers I had. Since Butters was Kenny's project partner, I assumed he would be joining us. Butters never really looked nervous, but he had this childlike innocence about him. Any time one of the kids in class mention some derogatory sex act or unusual sexual activity, Butters always asked what they meant or what they were talking about. Sometimes I wondered if he had ever been with a woman at all. I mean, I haven't, but I'm not exactly normal.

By the way they all talked, I wondered how that worked, the sexual activities of a small town. The town I lived in, people had sex with each other all the time, but there were so many people that no one ever noticed. In a town like South Park, everyone would know. Well, wouldn't they? Everyone knows everyone in this place. They all talked like they knew everything about sex, but I thought they just played up what they saw online. I'm not any more experienced than they probably are, but still. Maybe they were just good at keeping secrets.

I had an interest in sex, I had hormones and feelings, they just were never directed toward anyone. I admit to being frustrated and a little confused about my sexuality. Frustrated because I had no way of getting rid of or easing the feeling of wanting some sort of.. Friction. Confused because I had never had a crush on a person in my life, which I knew was not normal. I had read about people who were pansexual, who based their sexuality on personality, and I thought that maybe I just hadn't met the right person. To be honest, I felt kind of disgusted with my urges. When I lie in my bed by myself wanting to be touched, or even just held, I thought less of myself at times. I always viewed myself as this concrete person, this wall of steel, made of stone. When I feel those sexual things, it contradicts who I am. I know that when the lights are off and the night is hot, I'm not being myself. I'm being an animalistic, instinctually driven, hormonal teenage boy. I liked to think I was different than that. I have a brilliant mind. I have amazing comprehension skills, I have a voice of reason, I have morals and values. I'm better than those urges. I just allow them to get the best of me at times.

Regardless of my worries of the town, I was really excited about getting to spend time with them tomorrow.

**_I was sitting and staring at a campfire. No one was around, we were in the middle of a vast fores, no city lights could be seen. The air smelled like smoke and snow. Despite the fact that no one could be seen, I heard a few conversations being held; the voices were quiet, as if someone had turned down the volume of a television. Even their laughs that sounded full-hearted and joyful were quiet. When I looked around, still, no one was there. There were old, water-damaged tree-stumps stuck into the ground, circling the fire; I was sitting on one._**

**_I recognized this place from a dream I had before, only this time there was a campfire. I had been here before, I smelled this cold air, saw these trees, laid in this snow before. I looked down to see that I was wearing a blue coat and quickly reached my hand to my head to find that same blue, puff-ball hat that I had dreamt about before. I quickly looked around, almost frantically. There was a shack near here that I had hid in before._**

**_Before I could collect myself, there was a dull thud of metal hitting something and I hit the ground hard. I heard a girl's surprised gasp. I sat up dizzily, only to be met with the same dull thud, falling backward onto the ground again. I just lie there with my eyes shut, in fear of getting hit again and I heard a lot of hushed conversation. There was a pause, and then I heard the conversation get loud, as if it were echoing in my head._**

**_"Come on baby, you want to, I know you want to. Come on." A hushed, distorted voice said._**

**_"No, stop." A girl fought, I could hear the rustling of coats, as if a struggle were happening._**

**_I heard the male voice continue to try and coax the girl, and more fighting continue. I opened my eyes and I still saw no one. The fighting continued, until eventually there was just sobbing and pleading._**

**_"Craig?" A girl sobbed._**

**_That voice, for some reason, sounded so familiar to me. I had heard that voice say my name so many times before, I knew I had. I knew that voice. My eyes widened to the point of hurting and I took in a deep, sharp breath. I was staring down at pink carpet, and when I looked up I was in the spare bedroom of my house. It was empy._**

**_"Craig, give them back!" A girl yelled. It sounded as though she were about to start crying._**

**_Before I knew it there was horrible, terrible screaming. It was so loud and blood-curdling I couldn't help but hold my head. It was as if the screaming was coming from inside of my ears. I tried to cover my ears and block it out, but no matter my attempt, the volume of the screeching didn't change. I opened my eyes again to see that I was back in the forest. I got up so fast I nearly fell over, but I started to run. I tripped over the snow a few times, but I didn't stop. I just kept running. I could still hear shrieking, that horrible screaming. My head was spinning and I was trying to look back to be sure that no one was following me. I felt myself hit something wooden, I hit it hard. I fell backward onto the ground and held my head. I could feel blood running down my neck. I looked up to see the rotting, sagging shed that I saw before._****_  
><em>**


	6. A House on Wheels, Head Over Heels

** Author's note: I apologize for my slow update, my laptop quit on me and I'm now doing updates from my phone, which has proven to be difficult. Bear with me, please.**

The next morning, I awoke feeling disgusting. I was shocked I hadn't burned a damn hole in my mattress, I felt like I was on fire. Going downstairs and drinking every liquid in the fridge had become a morning ritual since our move back to South Park. It had become so normal, in fact, that my mom barely noticed I did it anymore. I think the only time she mentioned it was if she let a snide comment escape her lips at the grocery store, something like, "Better get a lot of apple juice, you know Craig is a sponge in the morning." Or something of that nature. My mom never used to joke around with me, I really never knew she could be any fun. In fact, since our move back, they had been happier than I ever remember seeing them. They laughed now, more than ever. Somehow I felt like I was looking in through a window on their happiness, as if I wasn't really a part of it. Not to say that anything about South Park was really a problem, the kids were nice, the school was decent. I just couldn't handle the nightmares and the constant feeling that I was missing something. I felt as though everyone was keeping a secret and I was the only one left out of it.

Regardless of my discomfort, I liked seeing them smile.

Today I was going to go over and see Stan, Kenny and probably Butters. Stan said he would pick me up around two, and right now it was noon, so I had a couple of hours to relax a bit and shower. I started up the water and removed my boxers. I climbed into the shower. The warm water running down my neck, which would usually soothe me, disgusted me. I kept feeling as though I was bleeding and when I opened my eyes I would see the water turning red. Of course, that never happened, but the feeling was still there. I didn't want to close my eyes in fear of being hit by something at my weakest moment.

Eventully it was about twenty 'till two and I was sitting in my living room waiting for Stan to pull up. I was just enjoying the feeling of being home alone. I had been alone quite a bit, since my mom was transferred to the South Park medical facility. She was an obstitrician. My father who used to be an accountant had now decided to make a living out of hunting game, after briefly discussing the matter with Clyde's father, Roger. I suppose they didn't really need more than my mother's income as a baby doctor, she got a decent amount of money from that. My mother agreed entirely with my fathers retiring from his career, as she didn't think it was fair that he hated his job and she loved hers. My mother had a great passion for life and helping bring it into the world. I always wondered why I was an only child.

I heard tires pulling up the drive and snapped out of my thoughts, I pulled back the curtains to be sure it was Stan. There he sat in the driver's seat, looking down at his cellphone. I got a text from him while I was heading out the door, telling me he was out front. I sighed a few times and gathered myself and headed out with a smile.

Kenny's house wasn't a house, it was a trailer. It wasn't really even a nice trailer. The front door was rickety and the screen was barely on the rusted hinges, making this awful screaching noise when you opened it, I couldn't help but hold my ears, as it sounded like a scream. Stan knocked at the door and we waited there for a bit. Soon enough, Kenny came to the door and looked outside in both sides of the trailor, then invited us in. He wasn't in his usual attire, he wore loose jeans and a black tanktop. His hair was a mess as though he had just woken up, he just looked uncomposed. I would almost say he had forgotten completely that we were supposed to meet today.

"Dude, you look gross." Stan said bluntly, "Go take a shower or something."

Kenny grumbled, then waved him off. After a few minutes we heard running water, so I assumed he had taken Stan's advice and decided to take a shower. While he was gone we just kind of sat there awkwardly while I checked out his room. It had a smell of dirt and dust, somewhat of wet wood. I looked at his window and saw that the sill was wet from it being unable to close. I guess that explains the scent of wet wood. He had clothes on the floor, cans by the bed, and his closet door was ajar. After a while I got bored of looking around his room and we just sat there quietly, staring at our laps.

"So have you come up with anything yet?" Stan asked me, still seeming rather awkward.

"Oh. Yeah, a few. I found out the most popular flavors to have are vanilla and chocolate, but I think that's pretty obvious. I didn't find much on anything else, it's all based on how much you want to make. Thought I would ask you before I carved in it stone, you know?" I rambled shyly.

He smirked at me and nodded his head. I guess I kind of sounded like a huge dweeb. I really needed to calm down a bit. I was just really nervous. For the remainder of the time Kenny was in the shower, we both sat there on our phones being bored. I had a feeling this wouldn't have much to do with our project, since Stan and I were sitting right next to each other and not doing anything project related. I found myself wondering where that Butters kid was, because at least I knew I was cooler than him. Listen to me, "cooler than". I'm turning into a huge asshole. I was never the kind of guy to care what is "cool" and here I am doubting my self worth over a couple of kids I don't even know. No matter how I reasoned with it, I still wanted them to like me.

Eventually the door swung often and a completely naked Kenny came into the room. He looked at us as if to say, "what the fuck are you doing here?" Making no effort to cover himself in any way. Stan lifted the folder in his hand and gave him an annoyed look, earning a look from Kenny that said, "oh yeah, the project." What was this guy on? He let us in the house a half hour ago and seriously forgot we were here? I gave a questioning look to Stan and he shrugged, then shook his head with disappointment.

"Sorry. I was up kind of late." He said, his voice sounding rough.

Yeah, right. Up late. What, did he think we were stupid?

He finally puts a pair of baggy shorts on and sits in a ratty computer chair across from us. We kind of just stared at each other for a few minutes. He had this strange, questioning look on his face, like he was forgetting something.

"You drink?" He asked.

"No." I replied.

"Prude."

He sat back in his chair and looked me over again. Then he looked at Stan, who was looking through his folder for something. We just kind of sat there for awhile. Stan was kind of the voice of our group, and right now he was choosing not to use it. I was silently and sneakily looking Kenny over and trying to get a feel for his personality. He was only wearing a pair of shorts, despite the fact it was freezing in his house. His parent probably couldn't afford heating. His hair was half wet, half dry and didn't look entirely clean. He didn't really seem to care about anything. He always had this kind of bored expression on his face. If you ignored all of that, he actually wasn't a bad looking guy. He was thin, but not sickly looking, and had somewhat of a feminine facial structure. His jaw wasn't really defined, no facial hair, smaller nose.

"Take a picture." He said, eyeing me, "It will last longer. "

I put my hand on my neck and looked at my lap, "Sorry. I just feel like I've seen you before."

"You have, retard. We used to be in the same class." He said, rolling his eyes.

"Dude. Craig lost his memory, don't be a fuck cake. " Stan said in my defense, not looking up from his notes.

He looked at me curiously, I nodded quietly.

Stan waited a second, then noticing the silence, looked up and kicked Kenny, "He said that in class, asshole. Do you listen to anything?" Stan scolded, seriously.

Kenny put a hand on his head and narrowed his eyes, then shrugged. After we had some idle conversation, Kenny seemed to wake up a bit and everything was going alright. We talked about Kenny's parents lighting the kitchen on fire and his mom being pregnant again. Kenny always seemed to have a lot going on in comparison to his other friends. According to Stan, there was a burglary at Kenny's house just last week. What's strange about that is that none of his other friends have ever been robbed. He expressed a bit of concern and discomfort with his mother having another child, because they were very obviously not well off. Half of their house was broken or needed some kind of maintenance, which they couldn't afford. It was such an issue that it even had me worried, and I don't worry about much.

I never really felt bad about anything when it came to other people, but it never proved to be an issue to me. It all just seemed so menial to me for some reason. Typically people become apathetic towards the problems of other people when they've gone through a lot themselves, but I've never been through much. In fact, up until recently, I never had anything of interest happen to me at all.

After awhile, it started to get dark and Stan was getting some pushy text messages from his dad, so we decided to take off. Headed out of his dirty room, to his dirty living room and out the rickety front door. When we got to the stairs leading down to the walkway, I turned slightly to save back at Kenny. After that, I heard a loud crunch and found myself falling backward.

_ I opened my eyes and I was in my bed. I heard a lot of talking downstairs and I got up quickly, I felt like I was missing something important. I rushed toward the stairs, but I stopped short. Something was wrong here. I turned my head toward the spare bedroom and saw that nauseating pink carpet again. I don't know why, but seeing it, thinking about it, sickened me and made every bone in my body ache with discomfort. I looked toward the stairs, then back to the room. There lie a bare wooden floor, no carpet to be seen._

_ I shook it off and ran to the stairs, I was missing something. Something important. I got down the stairs and ran to the kitchen, the small, round table being my mission. When I got there, I saw my mom, dad, Clyde, Betsy, Roger, Tonya, and sitting in the middle of them was a young girl. They were all standing around the table, and in front of them was a cake with a large candle in the shape of a ten._

_ "Craig, you're late, honey. " My mom said, with a slight scold._

_ I looked at the girl, "What did you get me, Craig!?" she asked excitedly._

_ I suddenly felt a horrible burning in my hand and opened my grasp so quickly I dropped what I had been holding. There, on the floor, we're a couple of peach-colored hair ties. The sound in the room drastically changed to complete and eerie silence. I looked up from the hair ties and met eyes with Clyde,who had his hand on the girl's shoulder. Before I could say anything else, a shovel flew towards my face from no where and I was met with a dull thud, and then darkness._

_ Dude, are you okay? I thought._

No, I wasn't thinking it, someone else said it.

"Dude, come on, snap out of it. " I looked up to see Stan and Kenny standing over me.

"Dude, please don't sue me. " Kenny pleaded.

I was still disoriented and shook my head. Stan held out a hand, but I waved my hand at him and got up slowly. I looked behind me to see that the stair I was standing on had split in half completely. I must have got my head pretty hard, I was out cold.

"How long was I out? " I asked, still getting a hold of myself.

"About ten minutes, you were out good. Oh man, you're bleeding." Stan said, worriedly.

I put my hand on my neck and felt the hot, sticky mess. I looked at my hand and saw a smear of red. I wasn't really bleeding too badly, though. I could hear Kenny continuing to plead with me, asking me not to sue him, but his words were all a blur.

"I'm not going to sue you, dude. " I said, sounding a little more irritated than I had intended.

I ended up taking a shower immediately after I got home, and met the fear of opening my eyes to see the water at my feet turning a pinkish red.


	7. Shock to the Lungs, son

**Author's note: Apologizes for the lack of update. I had writer's block. Enjoy.**

It's funny how things work, you know? One minute I'm with my friends in Florida, the next, I'm sitting in a classroom staring at the snow falling outside. I couldn't consentrate lately. I kept spacing out and thinking about all the crazy things going on in my head. I guess I had a good reason to worry, but still, I felt like I was cutting out on my responsibilities. My school work was mediocre, I rarely left my house, and I can't remember the last time I did a chore. I'll be trying to make that up after school, I agreed to meet with Kenny, Butters and Stan at my place.

I was a little hesitant about it, but I figured that it couldn't do any harm. The bell ringing snapped me out of my daydream and threw me back into reality so quickly that I nearly jumped out of my desk. I sighed and calmed down a bit. I had been so on-edge lately, it's probably the lack of sleep getting to me. I was looking forward to taking a nap when I got home, since my project partners wouldn't be coming over until after dinner. I picked up my bag and waked into the hall.

"Craig?"

I turned around quickly and looked towards the voice to see Clyde. Hadn't he gotten a clue yet?

"Oh uh. Hey, Clyde." I said, still trying to come back to reality from my daydreams.

"How are you and your parents doing? We haven't heard much from you lately." He shuffled uncomfortably.

I really wasn't in the mood to shoot the breeze with Clyde, but I felt like cutting things short might make him suspicious. Although I wasn't doing anything to be suspicious of, I had this strange feeling that Clyde was snooping, or spying, maybe looking after what I was doing a little too much. His stare made me uncomfortable.

"Oh, we're alright. Mom's been buying a lot of new houseware for the kitchen and stuff, that's about it. She got this new expresso machine thing and it maes all kinds of fancy coffee. Mom doesn't even drink coffee." We both chuckled, "But I have to be going, I'm working on the project after school."

I don't know when I became the world's greatest actor, but I feel like he was pretty convinced that my life was as normal as it could possibly be at this point.

"Oh, dude, hold still, you've got a bug on your shoulder." He said, grabbing the strap of my backpack. I heard a weird noise and felt him pull, he made a flicking motion and backed p with a smile, "Got it, you're good."

"Alright, thanks.. I'll be going though, see you later!" I said with a wave.

"Oh alright, well it was good talking to you, feel free to stop by whenever." He said with a smile, giving me a pat on the shoulder and walking away.

Even though it was the long route from where I was going, I took the other direction, since it was safe from any awkward conversation.

_Thud._

Well, maybe.

"Hey Craig, are we still coming over at eight?"

Oh, it's just Butters. But so much for no more awkwardness. He was shaking like a leaf, which was even out of character for weird 'ol Butters.

"Butters, is something wrong? You look like you've seen a ghost, man." I said, tilting my head and putting a hand on his shoulder.

"Oh-oh, it's just those big fella's from the football team again, they uh-.. They took my binder." He said with a disappointed face, "Cartman can be such a- uh, douche."

I gave him a slight punch on the shoulder, "It's okay, dude, don't worry about it. I've got all the notes at my place. I'll see you at seven."

"B-but I thought you said," He stuttered.

"Oh right, eight. I'll be there, promise." I said, running off.

I swear if I run into anyone else, I'll die. At this point I just wanted to go home, take a nap, see Stan and work on the project. See Stan. I've been thinking about Stan a lot lately, and Kenny. What's up with Kenny anyway? He's always completely gone in just about every way possible. He must be on drugs or something. I know I saw beer cans on his floor when I was at his.. "House".

I got to my house and walked in the door. No one was home, all the lights were off. Since my mom was always so worried about me, this was strange. She never was away past four, and if she were, she would have left a light on. Maybe she just forgot.

I slipped my backpack over my shoulders and went to set it on the floor. Suddenly my hand felt like it was on fire, and I dropped my backpack on the floor and turned on a light. _What the hell? _My hand was bleeding, not a lot, but enough to notice. I went to the kitchen and washed off my hand, wrapping it in a dish cloth.

I picked up my backpack carefully, examining it. There was a shiny metal sliver sticking out of the strap. It was a razor. _Who the hell would do that?_ It didn't even make any sense, I'm usually really weird about leaving my bag alone, it's always really close to my desk.

_Craig. He had pulled on my strap earlier trying to get a "bug" off of me. Wait, wait. Would he actually do something like that? Craig? He's been nice to me since I got here, I don't know why he would do something like that, because it's not something I think anyone would consider a prank. _

Thinking I was just being paranoid, I shook my head and started baking some starter recipes for the project. I didn't want to wrap my wound yet, so I just held onto the dish cloth while I cooked. I baked three different sample cakes, all about the size of my hand. One was chocolate with coconut, one was chocolate with peanutbutter and the last was chocolate with chocolate chips. Since stan and I were really the only ones having any luck with the project, we had decided that a cup of each in the recipe would be sufficient, although for the samples I had to significantly lower the amount. I thought I had done a good job. I may even bring up the possibility of adding a small amount of coconut to any recipe we decide on, I'd grown to love the taste, not having really tasted much coconut before.

It was about seven, so I had another hour. I sat down in my living room and laid back, I figured it would be time wasted if I didn't at least try to catch up on lost sleep. I sighed, tried to relax, and closed my eyes.

_I heard laughing, and I couldn't breathe._

_ I was in a hallway, a school hallway, and the light from the windows was blinding. Everything was a braison gold and bronze. The floors were checkered, the walls were lined with tape from past student projects, long returned for the summer, and on every door there was some kind of decorative wreath. It wasn't any school I remember being to, it was small and it looked like there was just the one hallway we were walking down. A single hallway with a lot of doors, most of them open, and the longer I walked, the more I could see into them. They were all empty. I looked around to see that I was alone, but when I closed my eyes, I could hear a hallway full of excited students. Everything sounded like it was underwater. Most of their voices ran together into a flurry of random, blurred words and noises, but what I could make out were exclaimations of summer vacation. _

_ My lungs began to burn, so I took a hard gasp for air. As soon as I inhaled, I was rushed with colors and sounds so clear, they sounded as if they were coming from inside my head. I nearly went into shock from how sudden and loud everything became. I suddenly became excited, about summer and about the end of school. However, every time I passed a classroom, out the windows were snow. I could feel my excitement fading as I came to the realization, there is always snow in South Park. _

_ I stopped at a locker. 217. I looked down at my body. I was wearing a puffy blue coat._

_ "Craig, you're going to miss the bus!" I heard someone yell, "Craig!"_

_ And as I looked from the classroom window back into the hallway, I stopped in my tracks. I could see them. Students. And they were all staring at my with a posessed hatred._

_ "Craig." They all said. "Craig."_

_ "Craig."_

"Craig!" I heard, I sat up sharply, swinging my hands and flailing.

"Dude chill! Come on, it's fine, you're fine! Wake up!" Stan's voice said.

I sat up from the couch, panting, still swinging a little. I opened my eyes and looked around. I was in my living room. Butter's, Stand and Kenny were all staring at me with strange expressions.

"I- I'm sorry. I fell asleep." I said awkwardly.

They were all still staring at me.

"Dude, you're bleeding eveywhere." Stan said worriedly, "What did you do?"

I looked down and saw that I had dropped the dish cloth, I must have started bleeding more from stress or fear, or something. He's right, there is blood all over me. I even flung some when I was swinging my arms. I put my free hand on my head. I was sweating profusely.

"I need to go take a shower, I'm sorry. You guys chill out here, the cake samples are on the table." I said, still out of my head.

Stan nodded, but kept his worried expression. I think that's the first time I've ever seen Kenny have any kind of expression. Regardless, I needed a shower. I was sweaty and bloody and I needed help waking up after that.

As I stepped in the shower, I noted, this is the second time opening my eyes to see blood running down the bathtub drain.


	8. New, Borrowed, Blue, and Silver

I nearly forgot I had company by the time I got out of the shower, I was so wrapped up in my head, trying to make myself understand what exactly is going on with me lately. I feel like I've been in some kind of denial, the way I've been carrying on as though my own mind wasn't scaring me to death. Something was very obviously wrong. But what do I do? Go to my mom and tell her I'm nuts? That I'm dreaming memories, and that they're fucked up? I wouldn't want to worry her.

I heard a knock on the bathroom door.

"Craig, is everything okay in there?" I heard my mom ask.

"Everything is fine, mom. Just had a bad dream." I said, drying my hair.

She muffled some kind of confirmation and walked away. I wonder if Stan, Kenny and Butters are still downstairs. I feel like I owe them some kind of explaination, but I don't know what to tell them, either. Considering how difficult it's been for me to make just these three friends, mainly just Stan, I really don't want to scare them off with my ridiculous inner struggles.

I walked out of the bathroom, and the cold hit me like a ton of bricks. I swear it nearly knocked me on my backside, why was it so cold in here? I looked around and I saw that everything seemed to be normal. I started down the stairs and I could see the guys still relaxing, talking like normal, but I felt like I needed a coat. Weren't they bothered by it at all?

"Hey guys, are you cold?" I asked them.

They all turned toward me, Kenny was still kind of chuckling, and then they all turned to each other with awkward smiles and confirming shrugs, stan replied, "Not at all, we're pretty comfortable."

For real? Were they serious? It felt like it was below zero in here. Oh well. I grabbed a jacket from a hook by the door and sat down on the couch. I noticed they hadn't tried any of the cakes yet.

"You guys didn't try the cakes out yet?" I asked.

"Nah, we thought we'd wait until you got back to talk about it." Stan said with a smile.

I smiled and nodded. I started handing out the paper plates and cutting the cake, I explained what each one was, how much of the extra ingredient I put in, and my notes for how it reacted with heat while I was cooking. We all just kind of relaxed for awhile.

Kenny looked really at ease today, I noticed. He wasn't filthy, his clothes were clean, and he seemed sober. It was a nice change. I couldn't help but find myself watching him as everyone laughed and carried on. He was a really attractive guy although small in stature, with his platinum blonde hair and deep blue eyes. I felt some kind of weird feeling while I was watching him, this nervous, heated feeling in my torso. It felt like there were cicadas buzzing in my chest to the rythm of my heart.

Have you ever felt a color before? I know it sounds silly, but sometimes I feel colors. Like when I'm watching the sunrise early in the morning, I feel like light blue and purple fading into yellow. Well, right now, I feel like a shroud of white over a fading green, surrounded by circles of yellow and pink. I feel happy, watching everyone laugh and enjoy themselves.

I remember saying before that I've never really had an attraction to anyone, and that I've never pursued any individual, but as I'm sitting here watching Kenny, I wonder if I should try it out. Unlike a lot of people, the thought of not being straight doesn't really bother me that much, but I don't really see myself as being a homosexual. I think it depends strictly on their personality, and watching Kenny change for the better these last few days has made me admire him greatly. I've been so wrapped up in my head that I barely noticed.

After awhile, Stan began to talk about heading home, and there was a lot of discussion about rides. Ultimately, I decided I was going for a walk, so I offered to walk Kenny home, since he lives pretty close to me anyway. He shrugged and Stan said he would drop Butters off at his house. On our way out the door, I noticed I warmed up a bit. Why was my house so damn cold anyway?

As we walked, I looked down at the pavement and watched our feet. Kenny's ratty hi-tops and my little generic tennis shoes. He had a surprisingly good taste in fashion for a poor dude.

"Craig, do you remember anything about me at all?" He asked me, hesitantly.

I shook my head and shrugged, "No, but that's okay. I'm kind of glad I don't. Sometimes the past gets in the way of things. It's been nice to have a new start here."

He was quiet for awhile. I could feel that intense discomfort, like something needed to be said.

"I did something really horrible to you in the past, and I don't want to tell you what it is, but I want to apologize for it." He said, furrowing his eyebrows.  
>I wasn't sure what I say to that, so I just looked at him and waited for him to continue.<p>

"I've been living my life day by day just trying to forget a did it, because it was really terrible. It's the worst thing any of us could have done." He continued, dropping off as though he said something he didn't mean to.

I looked back at the concrete again, hoping he would go on.

"And when I saw how normal you were, and how happy you were, and how yo didn't remember what I did, I.. I guess I felt okay with moving on from it. It was horrible, really horrible, but as long as you're okay, I'm okay." He said, looking from his shoes to me, "Are you okay?"

I paused for a minute and then looked at him, "Kenny, I'm okay, but if it's only because I don't remember, it will continue to eat at you. The issue isn't resolved, you know, man."

I said that, his face turned sullen, as though he knew it was true, but didn't want to admit it to himself. I have to admit, I really wanted to know what he did to me, because it might help straighten out some of the issues in my head. At the same time, I was afraid to know, because I liked him a lot. I almost didn't want to know. I almost couldn't stand to know, because from the look on his face, I knew it was bad. I did have one question to ask him, though.

"Is there a grade school around here?" I asked, seeming kind of random.

He paused for a minute, he must have been a little confused.

"Well, there's the new one and the old one." He said, trailing off.

"The old one?" I asked.

"The one over by Starke's pond. It was shut down after a tree caved in almost half the building. It's condemned." He said.

I took a second to myself to gather my thoughts. I wanted to ask him more, I wanted his help, but if I started remembering, what would he do? I had a lot of worries, but my mind was racing. I was getting somewhere.

"Kenny, do you have a crowbar?" I asked him suddenly, not even realizing the words were coming out of my mouth.

"Yeah, man. Why?" He asked, looking up at me questioningly.

"I need to do something, can I borrow it?" I asked.

"Sure man, just let me run inside and grab it." He said.

I actually didn't even realize we were at his house, I was excited, and nervous, maybe even a little afraid. At this point, I came to reality about what this could mean. I could get in trouble, my mom would be worried about me, it's already nine. After thinking back at all the things I saw in my head, I knew I needed to get into the old school, if even just to confirm that my dream about the school was real. Since it happened only earlier, the feelings, the sounds, the look of the place, it was all still fresh in my mind. I needed to get this over with.

Kenny walked out of the house, trying not to let his door squeal.

"You have to let me know what you're doing dude, if it's something illegal, I can help you. I don't want you to get caught." He said, sounding like he was almost asking me not to go.

I hesitated, "I'm going to the old school. You can come, but only if you're going to encourage me. I've never done anything like this before, okay?"

He bit his lip, looked back at his house and nodded. At that, we were both on our way. After a few minutes, I started to get a sick, nervous feeling in my stomach. I looked over at Kenny to see how he looked, and he was completely fine. It's like we weren't even breaking and entering to him, this was a totally normal night. Maybe he just hides it well. I looked over the pond as we walked around it to the old school, it felt strange that everything was so peaceful, when it felt like a storm was brewing inside my head.

There was only a dirt path, now overgrown by vines and trees. When we got to the bulding, I looked it over. It looks like the tree that fell had long degraded, and the school was left not tampered with entirely. Kenny mumbled something about them trying to tear it down a few years back, but the town protesting, claiming it was a part of the town's history. There were bricks falling out at the sides, and most of the windows were smashed. I could only see one that wasn't, and it was so filthy, I could barely tell it was a window at all. At this point, I was afraid. Afraid that when I entered, there would be nothing in there worth finding. Afraid that we might get caught. Afraid that we might get hurt. But I was so out of my head with determination, it felt like I was having an out-of-body experience. I looked over at Kenny.

"You cool, dude?" He asked.

I nodded and walked up to the front doors. One was gone, the other was ajar, so I walked into the one that was gone. We hadn't thought to bring any flashlights, so we could only see with the light of the moon through the gaps in the roof. When I got in the door, I could tell others had been here. There were a few beer cans, and some graffitti littering the place. It seems like the further back towards the wreckage we got, the less had been tampered with. I counted the numbers on the lockers. They started at one, then two was on the other side of the hallway. It was exactly like my dream.  
>I started walking further into the torn up building, hearing Kenny warn me about the roof caving in, but continuing anyway. The further I got, the more vines and trees I began tripping over.<p>

213.

215.

217.

I stopped at the locker and looked around. It's exactly how I had dreamed. This was my locker, and as if some kind of supernatural force were egging me on, a lot shown through the roof landed directly onto the locker, lighting it up. I stare at it for a minute, then I took a hard jab into the side of it with the crowbar. I pried for a minute or two, nothing. Kenny walked up and held out his hand, and with that, he jammed it into the top of the locker and pried for a second.

_ There was an unsettling click._

I think my heart stopped beating as it slowly cracked open, just enough to see a single textbook. I opened it the rest of the way, and looked it over. It seemed like everything had been left untouched. There were textbooks from all the subjects that had slight water damage from sitting at the bottom of my locker, some notebooks, and I went up a bit further to see a blue coat.

"Oh man, you used to wear that thing every day." Kenny commented, "There's your mittens."

He pointed to the top of my locker where two mittens and a puffball hat were. A blue hat. With a yellow puff ball. I've seen this before in one of my dreams. I picked up the coat, the mittens and the hat. Under the hat was a key. I picked the key up and shuffled in my pocket for my house keys, I pulled them out, chose the bottom lock to the front door to compare them.

Identical.

Kenny suddenly got very quiet and backed away a bit.

I looked to the inside of the door to the locker to see there were a lot of things posted with tape and magnets. There was a paper I got an A+ on, a note from my mom, a decoratve post-it with "Craig" fancily drawn on it. I did that in class one day, I remember. Below everything else, there was a picture. It was of my mom, dad and myself. With us, there was a girl with long, strawberry-blonde hair. I had dreamed about her. Her hair was in pigtails, held up by two peach-colored hair ties.

Those hair ties. Those were a birthday gift from me.

I just stood there for a minute, before reaching for the picture. The tape that held it up flaked away as I tugged at it. This has been in here, locked in here, for four years. I looked back at Kenny, I suddenly felt a weight off of my shoulders. He looked worried, like something just went wrong. But I didn't care, I was too happy to finally be getting somewhere, to finally be confirming that what I've been dreaming was true.

So elated, in fact, that I found myself with a hand behind his head and my lips pressed against his.


	9. Her

We hadn't talked since then. I felt so strange about it, I just wasn't sure how to bring it up. What's strange is that he didn't fight it, or push me away, he just allowed it. But when he realized what exactly happened, he ran off faster that I've ever seen anyone run before.

_So elated, in fact, that I found myself with a hand behind his head and my lips pressed against his. _

_I knew, immediately after it happened, that it could be a horrible mistake. His lips were soft and wet, and pink for him biting them all night. I didn't move from where I was, I didn't open my eyes, I just kept my mouth pressed tight against his, hoping that would prevent him from making any objection. With that, I moved my hand from the back of his head to his cheek, and placed both hands on each side of his face, continuing the kiss. I could feel him shaking,and hear his staggered breathing, but he didn't pull away. I wanted him to wrap his arms around me and kiss me with the same passion, but his arms stayed stiff at his sides. I pulled away slowly and opened my eyes to see that his were still closed. He slowly opened them, took a few steps backward, and ran off toward the direction of his house._

And now, here we were in class, silently listening to the lesson. I kind of wanted to know what he thought about it, but then I kind of didn't. I figured he was uncomfortable with me mentioning it, so I just kept quiet about it. I was confused by it, myself, I wasn't really in a position to explain.

It was the last hour of the day, and we all had to turn in the final outline of the recipe of our cakes, we had decided on chocolate cake with chocolate chips, and a small amount of coconut. The sample we made of each turned out really well, but I still needed to test the final recipe to be sure.

The bell rang and everyone bolted out the door, except Stan, who waited for me by the door to walk home with me. We were headed to his house to test out the final recipe, he had invited Butters and Kenny as well, but whether or not they were showing up was questionable. Butters was always grounded, or getting beat up by Cartman, and Kenny, well.. After last night, I'm not sure he wants to see me right now. We walked up to Stan's house as he fumbled with his keys, and walked inside.

Wow, Stan's house was really clean. I guess he did say his mom stayed at home all day and his dad worked, so I guess it makes sense that it would be clean. My mom is always on the job, lately, called in at ridiculous hours of the night for emergencies. His kitchen was even spotless. To be honest, I felt bad cooking in it, because I'm messy.

"Craig?" Stan asked.

"Oh, yeah?" I asked, snapping out of dream land.

"Did you grab your notes?" He asked.

"Oh, yeah, here's the recipe I decided on, look good?" I asked.

"Perfect." He said with a smile, shuffling through his kitchen and grabbing everything, "Since you did all the work last time, I'll do it this time. Just go chill in my living room, I'll come out when I've got it in the oven. Remote is on the table."

I shrugged and walked out to the living room. I smiled as I figured his mom wouldn't want is company screwing up her kitchen. As soon as I hit the couch, I heard a knock at the door.

"Can you get that, dude?" Stan called from the kitchen.

I walked up to the door, knowing who it would be. Opened it. There stood Kenny, staring at his feet. When he looked up he kind of obviously avoided eye contact, so I waved and stepped aside, letting him into the house. I told him Stan wanted to cook, so we took a seat on separate ends of the couch, silently.

You could cut the tension with a knife. I mean, I totally get that he's probably creeped out, or embarrassed, or insulted, but I felt like I should apologize. I mean, I wasn't really sorry, I enjoyed the kiss a lot, but I felt like I owed him an apology for making him feel uncomfortable or violated.

"Hey man, about last night, I'm sorry." I said softly.

He looked down at the coffee table, then up at me, "For what?"

"For making you feel uncomfortable, or violated or anything." I continued.

"Oh." he said, looking back down at the table.

It was quiet for a few minutes, I could see that he was thinking. Hell. I could practically smell the gears smoking. Seconds felt like minutes as I begged to God he would say something else.

"I wasn't insulted by it or anything, I don't feel 'violated'." He explained, then chuckled, "I just always thought my first kiss would be with a chick."

As if on que, Stan walked in and heard that. We looked at each other, then at Stan. I opened my mouth to say something, but he raised a hand and shook his head.

"Nope, I'm not even going to ask." He said, sitting down on the chair across the room.

Kenny and I both laughed a little, even though Stan's face was serious. I felt like Kenny had more of a reason for being freaked out than that. If he wasn't uncomfortable with me kissing him, why did he run away?

After a little while, normal conversation went on between the three of us. We were laughing and carrying on, and sampling the cake, which turned out great. The night flew by and a few hours later I was walking home with Kenny. The sun was just going down, so everything was illuminated in orange and red. I looked Kenny over. He was wearing basketball shorts and a hoodie, with his black and white hi-tops. It's always cold in South Park, so fuck if I knew why he was wearing shorts, but I didn't question it. It's not like he has the money to buy a full wardrobe.

"Craig, why did you kiss me anyway?" He asked suddenly.

"Why did you let me?" I retorted playfully.

We were at a stalemate. Before he could answer, we reached my house.

"You can come in and warm up if you want, no one is home yet anyway." I said, waling up my porch and looking back at him.

He looked like he didn't want to come in, but he didn't want to continue walking, because it was cold. After a minute, he followed me up the porch and we walked inside. I gestured to my couch and walked into the kitchen to put on some coffee.

"You drink coffee?" I asked.

"Gross." He replied from the living room.

I chuckled at that and grabbed him bottled water from under the counter. Figured he didn't want anything cold. I walked into the living room and handed him the water, sitting down on the couch. It was pretty quiet for a few minutes, then we were chatting a little bit about school and the town. But part of me kept staring him over like some kind of hawk at it's prey. I was silently punishing myself for being so.. Ridiculous.

"I have to know, Kenny. If you weren't uncomfortable, why did you run away?" I asked, kind of seirously.

"Because.." He thought for a minute, "If you knew what I did, you wouldn't have kissed me."

That was a lot more honest and serious than I thought it would be.

"Will you tell me what you did?" I asked.

He shook his head, not breaking his stare from the table.

"Does it have something to do with the girl in the picture?"

As soon as I said that, he got up and started to walk out the door, but before he could turn the knob, I pulled him hard by the sleeve of his hoodie and pushed him against the door, not using much force. We stared at each other for a solid five minutes, maybe longer, and started breathing heavily and his eyes were tearing up, he looked like he was either going to throw up or hit me. Before he pushed me off and walked out the door, I heard his shaky reply.

"Her name was Mary."

_Was._

After the door slammed shut, I just stood there with a dumb look on my face, like it didn't actually happen. Ater that, I slowly walked up to my room and laid in my bed, staring up at my ceiling in the dark. I started to drift off, but not entirely.

_It was nothing but black._

_I could hear wind blowing hard against creaking wood and russtling leaves above me. I could smell the crisp air, I could smell the cold. I couldn't feel my face at all, only tingling all over my body. I felt pressure on my face, a lot of pressure, and I could hear a buzzing or ringing in my ears. I realized after a few minutes that I was face down on the ground, when I tried to lift my head, I felt resistance. I tried harder to lift my head, and felt something dry on my face sticking to the snow. I couldn't open my eyes, they were stuck shut homehow, so I tried to get up. Everything was spinning. I continued batting at my face and eyes with freezing, gloved hands. I felt scarping on my face from the snow, and every time I made contact, I could feel it tingling from lack of bloodflow. I staggered along for some time, in a random direction, until I could partially see out of one eye. I was in the woods. I looked back at the trail I had made to see that I was walking from an old, beat-up shed. I continued on my way, trying to make out some kind of navigation, but I was trying to keep my face down, shielding it from the cold. Eventually, I made it to a road. I walked on the road for ten minutes, twenty minutes, thirty minutes, until I suddenly saw a pair of bright lights headed in my direction. The lights, a car, stopped in front of me. I heard a woman gasp and several muttered questions and noises that I was too confused to make out. I looked in the side mirror of the car to see my face covered in dried, red blood. It covered my eyes, and my forehead. _

_The whole time, I thought it was snow._


	10. I'd Do Anything to Breath Underwater

**Author's Note: This chapter is going to have a little bit of sexual content, but not a lot. The storyline is currently on pause due to some disagreements, but we're currently consulting and will continue in the next chapter. Thank you.**

I can't remember why I liked this class, now that the year had progressed. English was usually my good subject, but this teacher always paid more attention to the detail and description of our papers, rather than the actual information. I frequently dozed off, due to his repeating, monotonous voice. It was storming in South Park today, so everything felt very dark, like it was night time. It kind of reminded me of when I lived in Florida, and how we used to sit in the day room when it was raining just to see the birds come out and sing. I missed that a lot. There wasn't much sign of wildlife here to talk about, aside from deer and the occasional mountain cats. This town just feels so cold, lifeless, desolate. Like we're isolated from the rest of the world.

I had been thinking a lot about what information I had so far, about the dreams and how I could keep myself from going insane. About Kenny, about school, about my mom working so much and being home so little. My mind was so full of random worries that I found it hard to consentrate. Sometimes it feels like I'm dreaming with my eyes open. Kenny hasn't really talked to me much since the night he walked out on me. I've decided it would just be best not to ask him questions and just let him tell me any information he feels comfortable with. After all, I don't know his position or his story. I thought about heading over to his house after school, but with it snowing so bad, I'm not even sure how he's going to get home. South Park having such a small high school, no one really noticed who went and came, so they probably don't offer any kind of emergency rides. There was only one bus, and it went to the far side of town, so I guess we'd both be walking.

The bell rang and it was time for our last class, House and Home. I really enjoyed the class, and not just because it was easy. It just came to me naturally. Cooking, especially. I looked around the hallway as I walked and saw Kenny walk to his locker and grab a book for his next class. I walked over to him and he looked up at me.

"Oh, hey." He said, staring at the ground and facing me, "What's up."

He's not sober. He has those dead, lifeless eyes and that lack of concentration. I have to admit, I was genuinely disappointed, but I knew that telling him that wouldn't help the situation. I was trying to stay on his good side, since I made him uncomfortable with the questions last time.

"What are you on?" I asked, lowly, "And don't say you're just tired."

He looked around and then up at me, "Just some pain killers, I'm fine."

I sighed and shrugged it off, "Yeah, well let's get to class. Wanna walk home with me today?"

He shrugged, "I mean, I live a street away from you, so it's in the same direction."

He's always so bland and unopinionated when he's high. He's like an apathetic zombie. I like him more when he has things to say, even if what comes out of his mouth isn't very bright. He wasn't the most educated guy in the world, and with his parents being the way they are, I can't blame him for that. I kind of appreciated that he wasn't super smart, because most people who are just aren't very friendly. Kenny wasn't the friendliest, but he could hold a decent conversation and joke around, that was good enough for me. I wanted to see a different side of him, something past the friendly Kenny. Part of me figured that wasn't going to happen, but I figured I could hope.

By the time we got out of our last hour, he had sobered up a bit, but he still wasn't back to normal. We met up by his locker, decked out in winter gear and bracing ourselves for a cold walk home. We took a look at each other, shrugged and pushed through the doors and into the flurrying outdoors. By the look of it, there was about a foot and a half of snow with no sign of stopping anytime soon. This is the most I had seen it snow since I'd been here, probably because it's fall. We didn't say much on the way to his house, but when we got there, he waved for me to come inside. I stepped past his broken stairs and into his house, and we both let out a big breath.

"G-g-g-god it's freezing out there.." He said, taking off his gloves and stretching out his hands, "Thanks for walking all the way back to my house, dude, but you didn't have to."

I actually hadn't noticed where we were until I saw him stop walking. I had my face burrowed in my coat and didn't look up the entire time. I figured he'd stop when we got to my house, but I guess he was just wanting to get home fast.

"I couldn't see where we were going," I explained, "But that's fine as long as you don't mind me warming up for awhile."

He shook his head and took off his coat. He was wearing a black t-shirt with a Blink182 logo on it, long jeans that had dark blue patches on them from being wet, and of course, his hi-tops. I swear he wore those things every day, but it's not like he has a lot of cash, and they look good on him anyway.

I looked down and unbuttoned my coat, but when I looked back up he was undoing his belt and stripping down to his boxers. I gave him a weird and surprised look, but then I remembered that his pants were wet and cold, so I shrugged it off. He walked into his room and came back out a few minutes later with a movie and a blanket. He gestured to the couch, so I sat down. For not being well off, the TV was surprisingly nice. I guess his parents have their priorities straight. He tossed me a side of the blanket and we started watching a movie. He didn't bother telling me what it is, or even really mentioning anything to me at all, but I didn't care. I was focusing on not trying to look at him too much, not trying to picture him in his boxers and not trying to kiss him. After awhile, I got more relaxed and leaned back a bit, and Kenny is always relaxed, so he was sprawled out everywhere. His leg was touching mine.

"Dude, you're wet. Take your jeans off or something." He said to me, his eyes not leaving the screen.

I was really uncertain about that, mainly because being half naked in a strange place was uncomfortable, but also because I felt a little warm from my stomach to my groin. Disregarding my worries, I kicked them off, being down to my blue plaid boxers. My face felt hot. I looked over at him to see him completely unemotional in any way, his eyes were glued to the screen. I was secretly looking for any sign that I should lean in and lay a kiss on him or something, but he gave me practically nothing to go on.

As the movie went on, the more I was having trouble concentrating, I thought I was going to fall asleep. I looked toward him and saw that he looked pretty tired as well, but I didn't want to sleep. At this minute, I was longing for some kind of contact, some kind of friction, some momentary osculation. I was starting to feel jumpy. I think he may have even noticed, because I could see him looking at me from the corner of my eye. I looked back at him.

"Are you feeling okay? You're shaking the whole fucking couch." He said, cursing, but not mad or irritated.

I looked over at him. I felt like if I opened my mouth to say something, I might just say something ridiculous, so instead, I just sat there for a moment, practically bouncing with anticipation. After a few seconds of exchanged expressions of discomfort, I think I may have actually felt my insides explode. I pounced onto him, immediately making contact with his lips, and pushing him against the arm of the couch. I could feel the surprise in his jagged body movements as he tried to situate himself differently, but ultimately just returned the kiss, half-heartedly. I was positioned between his legs, that sat arched up. After a second or two, I broke the kiss and looked at him for any kind of response. He laid there with his eyes wide and his eyebrows taking a place they usually don't in an expression of shock.

He cleared his throat, "I.. Like, I mean. The fuck?"

He didn't sound mad, it sounded like an actual question.

I didn't know what to say back to that, so I pressed my lips against his again, only more gently and less erratically. It felt to me like he was fighting with himself about how to respond. I can imagine this being very confusing to him, considering I didn't understand it myself. I was just flighting with animalistic urges. At any rate, I wanted to kiss him, so I did. As the kiss went on, I picked up the pace a bit, placing my arm behind his neck and pressing his mouth to mine even more deeply, which stirred a bit of a response to him, as I felt his hand lightly touch my side. I wanted desperately for him to kiss me back, but I could still feel him in conflict. Just when I was going to break the kiss, I felt his lips twitch a bit, and I slipped my tongue slightly into the opening of his mouth. He closed his eyes at that, and began to kiss me back.

I was so elated that he was returning the kiss, that I actually began to unintentionally put pressure on my groin by pressing against his body. However, since I was between his legs, it also meant putting pressure against his. As I started to feel myself grind on him, he let out a partial, muffled moan into my mouth. As much as I wanted for this not to stop, and he was even urging me to keep going with his actions, I knew this had gone far enough. I broke the kiss, and gave him a few more pecks on the lips and one on the cheek, and sat back on my legs in front of him. We were both breathing heavily, his shirt was up to his stomach and his hair was more of a mess than usual, his lips moist with my saliva. What got me though, is when I looked down at his jeans, I noticed an obvious bulge. It actually pained me to look away and bite my lip just not to jump back on top of him and continue.

"I.." He said, catching his breath and looking up at me, "I'm.. Not gay.. Dude.."

I felt a little hurt at that, kind of disappointed, but I didn't say anything back. I just pointed at the bulge in his jeans and looked away towards the window.

"Oh shit." He said, pulling his shirt down and closing his legs together onto his arms.

I laughed a little, "You're the first person I've ever kissed, and I still don't feel like I'm gay."

We both just kind of sat there for a minute, not saying anything.

"Then why me?" I heard him ask, as I looked out the window.

"There's just something about you that I like, I guess. I thought I was asexual." I shrugged, "I guess maybe I'm not."

It was quiet for a long time after that, and we both started watching the movie again. I could feel him thinking hard, next to me. He wasn't really watching the movie, just staring at the blanketed lap in front of him. I knew he was really confused. I was really confused. But I knew one thing. I totally got a hard-on for Kenny, and that's enough to tell me that I'm attracted to him.

After an hour or so of awkwardly continuing the movie, I decided I should probably go home and leave Kenny to his peace. On the walk home, I was looking up at the stars. I wanted this to all feel normal, and in the heat of the moment it did, but afterward it left me feeling confused and unaccepted. I wanted Kenny to not be confused, too. I wanted to just have a normal life, being happy and mundane like everyone else.


	11. My Pain is Just More Tangible

**Author's note: After looking over the story and noticing I should pick up the pace, I'm going to try to make a smooth transition and get the ball rolling. I apologize for the lack of updates, but without further interruption, here is chapter eleven. Enjoy.**

After that night, I felt a sense of loss. Not losing Kenny, but losing the friendship we had before. Not that he and I aren't friends, but at this point I realized there was no going back. He and I were at a point in our friendship that we couldn't understand ourselves or each other or anything in between. Even I was confused. I was confused by the way I felt for him, and the what I saw in his eyes while we were so close together. You would think all that could been seen was lust, or passion, confusion, but what I saw was more than that. I saw a child, weak and quivering with fear, standing out in the snow. I saw dread, and regret. Guilt. I just was unsure why. I also noted that the closer we got, the more recreational mind-altering materials he seemed to use.

Today was the presentation of our project, which we had already completed. The teacher seemed pleased with our effort, despite the fact that Butters didn't have much to contribute to the conversation at all. In fact, he sort of just stood there in the back ground while Stan and I presented. Kenny had been absent for a couple of days, which had me worried. The first day he was gone, I chalked up to him not wanting to walk through the snow, but it had melted some and now I was starting to get suspicious. I felt a little put-off, but I knew he wasn't staying away to intentionally hurt me, or make me worry.

Stan and I agreed to walk to his house after class, so I felt a little better. It still took all the sanity I had just to stay in my seat, I had been feeling disturbed by his absence all day. Oddly disturbed. Sometimes you can just feel when something is wrong, and this is one of those times. Another thing I had been feeling uncomfortable about all day was the fact that I kept making eye-contact with Clyde. Typically, I didn't notice him throughout the day, but since the narky little trick he pulled with my bookbag strap, I've been keeping one eye on him whenever he happened to be around me. The more I kept my eye on him, the more I noticed just how often he kept an eye on me. In fact, I noticed to the point that it was unsettling. Nearly any time I let him out of my sight, I'd look back at him to see that he was already looking at me. I started to feel as though I was some sort of prey.

"Hey, you coming?"

It's stupid just how much that startled me.

I nodded my head, giving a last glance back at Clyde, who happened to be looking at me, again. We walked out into the hallway with Butters, who seemed to to be kind of disappointed.

"Gee, I'm sorry fellas. I really wasn't much help to you on the project and you let me take credit anyway! .. I just don't know how to apologize, is all.." Butters said, rubbing the back of his neck and looking at the ground.

I shot a sympathetic look towards Stan. Sure, it was a little lame of Butters to skip out on us so much, but between Cartman and the extra-curricular activities his parents forced him into, Butters was.. Spread pretty thin.

"Nah, it's cool man, we know you're pretty busy these days. Just don't forget to relax sometimes, dude." Stan said, as we turned toward the door, giving a wave.

Just as we started to walk off, someone shoved past me, hard. I heard a laugh and turned in the direction of the culprit to meet a pair of winter-cold eyes, belonging to the obvious, and for the first time I shot back a look just as icy. At this very moment, I just declared war.

"Woah, what's his deal?" Stan asked, annoyed at the unprovoked assault.

I shrugged, anger still plastered on my face, "Come on ,we need to go check on Kenny."

By the time we got to his place, we could clearly see something was off. The driveway was untouched, as if no one had been home since the snow two nights ago, when Kenny and I had been watching movies. Even my old foot prints in the snow had been left completely how they were. No new prints in the snow. No one had come or gone since I had been there.

"Oh, well at least it looks like Ken has been out today." Stan said, referring to the tracks in the snow that he didn't realize were mine.

At this point, I figured Kenny would want to keep that night a secret,and since Stan has walked in on some seemingly suspicious conversations before, I don't want to give up anymore information unless I absolutely have to. At any rate, I knew Kenny hadn't left the house in two days, and that was extremely concerning. I walked past Stan, past the broken step, opening the broken door, and turned the knob on the inner door to Kenny's.. House.

At first glance, everything seemed to be in order, but then I realized the TV was on and only static was on the screen. I looked at the coffee table to see that our two cans of soda were still there, along with the DvD case. Blankets still sprawled out on the couch exactly how they were when I left. Everything was untouched. I walked past that and down the hall to where Kenny's room was, and I peeked through a crack in the door before I touched anything. I could see the desk chair and some beer cans, and I could hear breathing. I sighed in relief and opened the door the rest of the way. He was just sleeping.

I signaled to Stan to wait and I walked up to his bed. I looked him over and smiled, very briefly, before noticing something very, very wrong. He wasn't sleeping, his eyes were open, and there was a dark red stain on his face. On his arms. On his blankets. In quick response, I ripped the covers off of him and uncovered one of the most horrifically bizarre scenes I had ever seen in my life. There in front of me, he had scrawled in his skin, Mary. Mary. Mary, Mary, Mary. Mary. There wasn't a free space on his skin. I immediately pulled him up and shook him a bit. He just stared for a second, but then his eyes shifted to my hand on his arm.

"Kenny, what the hell?" I asked seriously.

"Mary." He said, blankly, as if it were the only word he knew.

"Who the fuck is Mary?" I asked, shaking him, "What the hell did you do this for?"

At this point, Stan had entered the room and was standing in the doorway, unsure of what to do, or even say. Kenny just muttered her name again and again. I took a moment, frantically lifting both of his arms to my face and lifting his shirt to inspect his sides. All of the wounds appeared to be moderately superficial, just deep enough to cause him to bleed. I was taken aback by one thing, though. There were previous scars, both faded and relatively new, they all were "Mary." I took a moment to think things through, and realized there was no real danger. I had to calm myself down and take care of this properly. None of the wounds were bleeding at this very second, all of them seem to be at least from the night before. He's going to be fine, I just needed to take care of him for now.

"Stan, I need you to go to the store and buy some anti-bacterial spray for me." I said, still kind of in shock.

I could tell that Stan was also very shocked. By the look on his face, I could easily assume this was his first experience with so much blood. Part of the reason I sent him out was just to get him away from the area for awhile. It's true that I needed something to sanitize the wounds, but the main motive was just to get him out of the house. I feel like he kind of knew that, as he walked out without another word.

I bent down to face him eye-to-eye and I saw a little of the light come back into them, as if he had been in a daydream until then. I stood back up and picked up his hands in an attempt to get him to stand. I tugged on them a bit, but he didn't really seem interested. I tried a bit more to get him to stand, but he just looked down at his lap.

"Come on. You need to get washed up." I said to him seriously, "Really. You've gone long enough without showering, that's obvious by the amount of oil in your hair. These will get infected."

He shrugged.

I walked out to the hall and into the bathroom to start up the shower. I figured I could help him wash off or something. I started the shower and searched around for a clean towel. Unfortunately, the one hanging from the shower rod would have to do, even though it had been there for God knows how long. I walked back into his room to see that he hadn't moved at all. I bent down to him again and gave him a serious look.

"Get up." I said, tugging on his arm a bit.

He grimaced, as I was touching one of his many cuts, but didn't budge. With that, I sat next to him, slung his arm over my shoulder, and proceeded to half-carry him to his bathroom. I set him on the toilet with the lid down and pulled his shirt over his head. Since he was only in his boxers, I figured I wouldn't have to take anything else off, although I blushed at the thought. At this point, he must have been enticed by the shower, because he stood up. I put a hand over my eyes as he slid off his boxers and stepped into the shower. I let out a sigh of relief, knowing I wouldn't have to help him wash up. That would have been difficult to explain to Stan, after all.

I walked out to the living room and took a seat on his couch, thinking. Whoever Mary was, we both knew her, and we were both close to her. After some of the dreams I had, I was afraid to start putting the pieces together. I was terrified to know what happened to _Mary_. I swear I felt sick every time I said her name in my head. Have you ever felt so much anxiety that you thought you were going to throw up? Everything gets hot and the room gets smaller, you start to feel your heartbeat in your hands, and the world stops turning. That's how I felt when I thought back to my dreams, or said her name. I felt like my body was going to break into a million pieces.

After awhile, I started to get concerned. It had been at least forty minutes since I left Kenny to tend to his business, Stan still hadn't returned and I was just sitting in silence in the living room. I got up and walked to the bathroom, standing outside the door, I could still hear the shower running.

I knocked twice. No response.

"I'm coming in." I said, trying to sound bold, as if I wasn't suspicious.

Everything outside the shower was untouched. Steam was clinging to everything, so much that the water couldn't have been a comfortable temperature. I walked over to the shower and hesitated before opening the curtain a little. Kenny was sitting on the floor of the shower, staring at the wall in front of him. His skin was red from the water, and a pale red stream was flowing from his body to the drain. I couldn't tell if it was new or old blood, but he had been in there so long I couldn't believe that it was old. Maybe the heat made a couple of his wounds start to bleed again.

"You know." I heard him mutter.

It actually took my by surprise, the way he said it. He sounded so.. Raw, and serious. Like, life-threateningly serious.

"You couldn't have possibly forgotten what I did." He repeated, "You have to know."

He looked up at me, and I could see the gut-wrenching pain in his eyes.

"I helped kill her. Mary." He said, Looking back towards the drain. "I helped."

He just kept repeating "I helped" over and over, nodding.

At this point, I didn't want to hear any more. I shook my head, trying to erase what he had just told me, but despite my efforts, I couldn't unhear what he said. What did he mean he helped? But he just told me something important, something I had assumed, but needed to hear. Mary was dead. Even more importantly, she was dead and I should remember it, but I don't.

I reached and turned off the water, but I was glad to see that he seemed more alive now. The color returned to his face, and he looked more aware, less zombie-like. I hadn't decided how to help him up off the floor of the bath, so I took a seat on the toilet and watched him, watching the wall. We probably sat that way for ten or fifteen minutes before I heard Stan walk through the door and down the hall.

"Oh. What are you doing..?" He asked, looking at us both.

"Just sitting here." I said, resting my head on my hand, still not sure what I was doing, "I would help him get out, but I'm not even sure he wants to get out."

With that said, he suddenly stood and got up out of the bath. Full glory, he walked out of the bathroom and down to his room without even grabbing a towel. Stan handed me a bag of supplies, a lot of which looked really expensive.

"Where did you get these?" I asked him, curious about if he actually bought them or not.

"My mom buys a lot of that stuff and we never use it, so I just grabbed some stuff from the cabinet in my bathroom." He shrugged, "Anything eventful?"

I shook my head, and stood up. I would have told him what Kenny said, but I was starting to feel like no one could be trusted. I just got this unexplainable feeling, like something was wrong. Someone was watching me. Something was going on behind my back. As much as I liked Stan, and as much as I got to know him, I just felt uncomfortable disclosing any information to him.

At that, I walked down to Kenny's room. He had put on some basketball shorts and was drying his hair with a shirt. He seemed kind of back to normal at this point. His movements were relaxed, and he was actually doing things. Maybe he was on some kind of drug that made him act how he did before. Maybe he was having a bad trip. I was kind of confused, to say the least. I heard the front door shut and looked out to see Stan had left. I shrugged and sat down on Kenny's bed. He looked over at me while he finished drying his hair and took a seat by me when he was done.

I grabbed the bag of supplies Stan had left and looked over a few bottles to find a Bactine spray. I grabbed one of the sanitized bandages and sprayed a bit on, then started to dab at the cuts on Kenny's shoulder. He winced every now and again, but aside from that, he didn't do or say anything. I could feel that there was a tension in the silence as I dabbed away, but I wasn't about to say anything and risk being shut out. He had started being more fourth coming about information, and I figured he would continue to talk if I kept my mouth shut. I could feel that he had a lot to say, but was either afraid, or unsure how to go about saying it.

Regardless, I was content with just sitting here, poking away at his wounds with a bandage. To be honest, I hadn't felt this content in quite a long time. Lately I'd been nervous, pensive, run into by anyone and everyone, never to be just left to my peace. Sitting here with him was peaceful, quiet, I didn't ave to worry about him doing something against me. At least not that I was aware of.

But out of no where, and suddenly, I heard his voice.

"I wish I could go back and save her." He said, and then whispered, "Like you tried."

_ All that came to mind was a dull, metallic thud, and that sound of a body hitting the ground._


	12. We Walk on our Souls

**Author's note: Happy belated Halloween! This chapter will include some sexual material, so if you are underage, I urge you not to continue without parental permission. Thank you, and enjoy. **

_ I was laughing, and the sun was shining. _

_ I was running through the woods, and all I could see were red hi-tops beneath me, sprinting through the fallen leaves. It almost felt as though I was flying. I could hear a voice behind me, but it was so distorted and echoed that I couldn't make out what it was saying. In fact, all of the sounds I heard were wrong. The crunching of the leaves sounded like it was an audio recording that had been slowed down and stretched. Unlike the rest, the laughing, my laughing and the laughing behind me, was very clear. It was clear, but it was wrong. It sounded like someone had layered an audio-graph, and the laughing inturrupted itself. It sounded like an audio-track that had been played over itself, over and over. _

_ I could smell the air, it was cold and fresh. The light through the trees cast an eerie, disfigured shadow that looked like long, twining fingers on the ground. I just kept running. I felt bare, like I had been wearing a body cast for years and it had just been removed. I felt light, and free. I looked down to see that I wasn't wearing a coat, just a long-sleeved, gray and maroon shirt. I looked up towards the sky, because it was so beautiful. The sun was setting, and the clouds were whisps of pink, orange and white. _

_ Suddenly I felt my foot catch on something and I was falling toward the ground at full speed. I got that weak feeling in my chest, like you do when you miss a step on the stairs. Unlike everything else, the falling felt like it were happening in real time, not slowed down and drawn out. My elbows hit the ground hard, when I had expected the leaves to pad my fall a bit, and I lost my breath. I rolled over on my back, and before I knew it, I saw someone trip over the log at my feet and fall right on top of me. He landed on me with a thud, and knocked the air out of me. I knew it was another boy my age, thirteen at the most, and we were both laughing. I could see his blonde hair, but his head was down. I laughed, even though my elbows were sore and I was still coughing from the impact. _

_ Some things, you look past the pain for._

_ As the other boy lifted his head and met eyes with me, I could feel my heart racing. His eyes were squinted from laughing, but they were still the same icy blue. Before I knew it, his lips were pressed against mine. They were cold, at first, but as the kiss progressed.. They warmed up. This was the most amazing feeling I had ever felt in my life. He rolled off of me and laid on his back by me, still catching his breath. I sat up with a chuckle to see two pairs of brand new hi-tops. One red. One black._

I shot up from my bed and let out a yelp, and a sob.

I was crying?

I threw my blankets off of my lap and walked down the hall to the bathroom. I turned on the light and looked in the mirror to see that I was, indeed, crying. Now, I know a lot of teenage boys try to say they don't cry, but I really didn't. I haven't cried in years.

But that wasn't the odd thing. The odd thing was that I was happy. I was crying, but I was uncontainably happy. I was just short of elated. But as sudden as the happiness came, the sadness covered it up.

Now I really was crying, only this time, it was because I felt a pain in my heart.

I hadn't realized I was covered in sweat until I started to feel a chill, from the cold air hitting my skin. I put a hand on my face and ran it down my neck. I was drenched in sweat. I could feel goosebumps from the cold beginning to form.

"Craig?" I was so caught up in my emotions, I hadn't heard my mom's foot steps in the hall, "Oh honey, what's wrong?"

I felt embarrassed, so I just shook my head and walked out. I walked to my room, threw on some jeans, a red t-shirt and.. My black generic tennis shoes. After that dream, it felt wrong to put them on. They just weren't me. On my way out of the house, I just kept thinking to myself about how much of a hallow shell I had been. I liked hi-tops. And I liked sweaters. I liked astronomy. I felt like I had discovered a part of myself that was hidden away, consealed for years. I rushed out of the house and started walking. It was early on a Saturday morning, only eight, so no one seemed to be out. I just needed some fresh air.

I walked along the road, looking in at the mom-and-pop shops. I just wanted to explore, today. I hadn't walked around South Park at all since we had moved here, aside from my adventure to the old school. I guess I might have been afraid of my memories resurfacing at first, but now, I want them to all come out. Last night was the first dream I had, the first memory, that hadn't made me feel angry, or sad, or scared. I wanted to go back to that time. I wanted to be that person again. Would that be possible?

As I walked along the sidewalk, I could see people opening their shops, stocking, getting ready for the day. It was like right out of a small town storybook, I swear. It was so.. Unrealistic, the way they all hurried inside with a smile, to get out of the cold. And the way they all waved hello to their neighbor shops. It was almost laughable. There was Harems, the imported goods shop, where they sold all kinds of weird pastries, and there was Jack and Dina's place, which was pretty much the only diner in the area. Aside from that, we had a couple of clothing shops. The shoes were brought up from a city a couple hundred miles South of here, but the rest of the clothes were made almost entirely in South Park. There was one old antique shop, and it was called Antiquil's. For some reason, I knew it wasn't there before, and I found it kind of ironic that the newest shop in town sold things that were supposed to be older than everything else. I laughed to myself.

I happened upon the clothing shop and walked in. I wanted to change my image, or rather, have one again. Honestly, after that dream, I was specifically looking for a pair of red hi-tops. I looked through the shirts and wondered into an area of men's sweaters, which I was pretty happy about. There were a couple of dark gray ones I liked, and a maroon one that I couldn't keep my hands off of. Up until now, I had let my mom do all of my clothes shopping for me. I never had a taste for clothes, I guess maybe it was because I never cared to look good for anyone. Regrettably, I had someone I wanted to look good for now. I wondered if he would even notice if I was wearing different clothes.

Carrying the three sweaters, I walked into the shoe aisle. After assessing the stock of shoes, I realized it was foolish to think they would still carry the same ones after five years. As I started to get disappointed, I looked over the shoes one last time I started up to the counter.

"Excuse me, can I help you with something?" I heard a woman's voice from behind me.

"Oh, I was just looking for some old hi-tops, but you don't seem to have any." I said, shrugging, trying not to alert her with my disappointment.

"Actually, I have some in the back, you're welcome to take a look if you'd like." She said, gesturing to a door near the back.

I walked back and took a look at the pile she lead me to. There were gray and black hi-tops, mainly, but there was a pair of blue and a pair of red near the end. The red ones were just my size. I grabbed them up and walked out of the back, back into the store. To my surprise, I walked up to the counter and spotted Clyde across the store. He noticed me instantly.

Not wanting to have any problems, I just continued what I was doing, and set the items down on the counter. I could still feel his eyes on me, so I looked up to see that he was peering over a magazine rack and looking at the hi-tops I was buying. The look on his face was hard for me to understand. He looked suspicious, maybe a little angry or worried. It was hard to tell which, but either way, it conserned me. I was still waiting for the woman to make her way up front, so Clyde and I were stuck in a staring contest. He kept looking down at the shoes, but eventually he must have grown uncomfortable, because he turned around and walked into an aisle of mens jeans.

After shelling out a twenty, I walked out of the store and back out into the strip. I was going to head over to Kenny's after this, so I stopped by Harem's and bought a couple of frosted cookies and slipped them into my back pack with the clothes I bought. On a second thought, I took out the hi-tops and sat down on the sidewalk to change into them. I wanted to see if it inspired a reaction from him. It would tell me if what I dreamt was real or not, and it might open him up to talking about the time in the woods, or events around that time. I tied the strings and flipped my pant legs over them. Tucking my old shoes into my back pack, I headed towards Kenny's house. I walked up to his porch to run into his mom. By this time, she was getting pretty big, being pregnant and all.

"Oh, hey Mrs. McCormick." I said with a wave and a smile.

She looked at me and smiled brightly, "Craig! I haven't seen you since you left for Florida."

I loved her country accent, despite us all living on the mountain side. It made me feel like home. Kenny's parents might be irresponsible, but they're nice people, nonetheless. My mom never really mentioned Kenny's parents, so I guessed they had never met, despite Kenny and I being so close growing up. Listen to me, I didn't even realize Kenny and I were friends as kids until this morning and I'm thinking as though everyone else should know.

I waved her off and she pulled into the street with her big, red truck. I turned back to the door to see Kenny, I guess he must have heard us talking outside. He smiled lightly and opened the screen door, but his smile faded when he saw my shoes. He just kind of stood there, like he had turned to stone. That confirmed my thoughts and shed light on any shadow of a doubt I had. That dream actually happened. I looked down to see he was wearing his old hi-tops. They were brand new in my dreams, and now they were all scuffed up and dirty.

"Hey Kenny, I found these at the old Dinsel's on the strip, aren't they cool? They look a lot like yours." I said excitedly, acting as though I didn't know the significance of them.

I guess I woke him up out of his daydream, since he put on a weak smile and let me in. I took a seat on his couch and he closed the door, heading over and sitting by me. It was quiet for awhile. It was really killing me, looking at him and seeing how unhappy he was.

His eyes were squinted from laughing, but they were still the same icy blue.

I've seen him so happy, so full of emotion, that it hurt to see him like this. I guess that's something I was missing before. Seeing him high, or emotionless was so normal to me, since I didn't know him any other way. How do the other guys stand it? How can they see this as normal?

"Ken, you remember everything we ever did together, right?" I asked him, looking down at my new red hi-tops.

He nodded slowly, looking down at his black ones. The look on his face is as if he were thinking, 'yeah, and I'm the only one who does.' It took me a lot of courage to say it, because I knew he would either be happy or angry, but I said it anyway.

".. Do you remember that time in the woods?"

I wasn't sure what he was thinking, but I felt like I either made the biggest mistake or the best move I've ever made in my life. His eyes got wide, and his head shot up, those cold, gray eyes suddenly looked ice-blue.

"W-What time in the woods, Craig?" He asked quietly, hushed, almost frantically.

I blushed, oddly, and looked down as he grabbed both of my arms.

"The time when we were running.. And you fell on me.. And we-" I was kind of shocked my the shakiness of my words. I felt like a stuttering, shaking child.

Before I could finish my thought, he got up, went to his room and closed the door. Did I say something wrong? I could hear him moving things around in there, so I slowly walked up to the door and reached to knock on it. Before my hand touched the wood, the door opened, and Kenny resurfaced with a box. It was a shoe box. It looked tattered and old like everything else in this place. His eyes met mine and he stopped walking. He looked nervous, and fumbled with the box when he realized I was right in front of him. He turned around and sat down on the bed, gesturing for me to sit next to him. I sat down and looked over at him, then at the box.

"I-I never thought I would be able to show you these.." He said, opening the box and setting the lid on the bed.

In the box was a pair of semi-new, red hi-tops. I reached over and picked one of them up. He pulled the flap back and pointed to the inside. On the inside, cut into the bottom of the shoe-slip were initials. K.M. Kenny reached down, took off one of his beat-up, black hi-tops and pulled back the flap to show the inside. There were the initials, C.T. As he slipped his shoe back on, I felt the warm breath ripped from my lungs, and in came a flurry of ice-cold air.

_ This time, I wasn't in my own body. It was like I was having a near-death experienced as I looked down at two young boys. I could see the sign, Dinsel's on the outside of the old strip store. The two boys were walking out, and they took a seat on the curb. _

_ "Craig, wait, before you put that on let me see it. The right one." Kenny said to the young me, with a youthful voice and a country accent._

_ I handed him my red hi-top and watched curiously as he pulled out a pocket knife and carved something into the right shoe of my pair, and then he handed me the left shoe of his pair, along with the knife. I looked at him curiously._

_ "Well don't just sit there like a block of wood," He said, his accent mirroring his mother's, "Put your initials in it! I want something to keep you with me all the time."_

_ He smiled wide and watched as I carved my initials into the bottom of his shoe. When I got done, I handed him back the pocket knife, without looking at him. He took that opening and gave me a kiss on the cheek. My eyes shot up to his and I put a hand on my cheek. I could tell that the younger me was confused. The young me smiled and looked down at the shoe, then put it on. While Kenny was putting his on, with shaking hands, I cupped his face and looked straight into his eyes. At that moment, Kenny looked shy and afraid, which was so much unlike his playful self that it made me nervous. I closed my eyes and I leaned in, kissing him for the very first time._

Coming to felt like I had fallen out of another realm. I coughed hard, and stood up, everything began to come back into focus.

"Dude, what happened?" Kenny said, standing up and taking me by the shoulders.

After taking a few deep breaths, and allowing the world to stop spinning, I put both of my hands on the side of his face, cupping it. He looked at me just as he did in front of the shop that day, with those icy blue eyes. I could feel my breathing quicken as my face crept closer to his. I closed my eyes, and my lips met his, just like the first time. I felt his lips begin to tremble, and a tear hit my hand as it slid down his face. As soon as I felt that tear, I knew it was real. We were close, once. He was happy, once. We can go back to that time again. I can bring him back.

My hands slid from his face to his shoulders, as I embraced him. As the kiss went on, he dropped the shoe box and it his the floor with a light thud. He was still quietly tearing up, and when he gasped, I slipped my tongue into his mouth. A moan escaped his lips as the kiss went on, urging me to continue, so I did. I felt his hands touch my chest, and rest there as we continued. The feeling of his hands on my chest was something I don't think I'll ever forget.

As the kiss went on, I felt him get a little more aggressive. I didn't realize just how aroused I could be. Just from this kissing and fondling, I felt like my stomach was going to implode. Before I could adjust, Kenny pushed me down on the bed and climbed into my lap, continuing the kiss. I had never seen his side of him before. The apathetic, nonchalant Kenny I knew for the past few months seemed to be erased as he lovingly caressed my face and passionately kissed me with his soft, wet lips. As he straddled my lap, I stifled a moan every time he would bump against my Southern region. I knew he had to be able to feel it, since I was hard as a rock, and he was nearly grinding on top of me.

I ran my finger tips down his bare arms as he pushed me back into a laying position on his bed. At this point, I wasn't sure exactly where we would end up, or if I was even comfortable with it going that far. He had to have sensed some unease, since he halted and leaned over me, staring into my eyes with his crystal blue ones. When I met him, they had been gray, and to see the life in them again made me want to cry. I was so happy to see the innocence in his eyes, the playfulness, the.. Love. That's what it was. There was love in his eyes again.

"I waited so long.. You were the only person around when I was a kid, and when you left, it was like none of my childhood ever happened.." He said to me quietly, "I.."

I felt a droplet hit my face, and I sat back up, placing my hand on his cheek.

"I-I'm still not sure if it ever really did happen, I.." He stopped as he gritted his teeth, trying not to let the tears continue.

I lifted my other hand to his other cheek and wiped the tears away, "It happened." I said it to him, but also to myself.

"It happened."


	13. Scandal by the Roman Candle

**Author's note: This chapter is disturbing and very sexual in nature. Take caution, and enjoy.**

In class the next day, it seemed like everyone noticed a difference in Kenny, especially Stan. I could see the confusion on his face. Since then, Kenny had a smile on his face, which was far from the usual distant stare. It was like watching the life flow back into a person's eyes, just after giving them a shock to the heart, reviving them. It hurt me to know that he had lost his faith so entirely that he had lost himself. It seemed to me like everyone in this place had. Even Stan seemed to have reservations regarding our friendship, and the friendship between me and Kenny. I just hoped no one confronted Kenny about it, because he was still very frail, and the slightest criticism would probably make him rethink everything. Kenny hadn't said anything all day, including to me, but he was smiling, and that was enough. The odd thing to everyone about his behavior, even to the teacher, was that he was taking notes. He actually care about school. He wasn't high on drugs. He was sober, and he was completely fine. I had brought him back.

Seeing the transformation was astounding.

"Dude, what's with Kenny? Not that I'm complaining, it's awesome to see him happy, but.." Stan whispered to me, a concerned look on his face.

I hesitated, "Well, I remembered something that was important to him from when we were kids.."

Stan looked at me, waiting for me to continue, but I didn't. I shrugged off his stare and went back to taking notes on the lesson. We had a test in two days, midterms, before Christmas break, and I didn't want to fail. I had been losing focus on school, I'd been so caught up with Kenny. I'm just praying they don't send a note home to my mom and dad. My dad's expressed on numerous occasions that seventeen isn't too young to get kicked out.

After class, I didn't see Kenny, so I went to my locker and dropped off some of my books. Once I was sure I didn't forget anything, I decided to head to the back of the building to leave. Although I almost always left from the front, the back of the school was closer to my house. I made my way through the doors and out into the cold. This time, the cold air was almost soothing, because the heat was on so high in the classroom. I could hear voices from the side of the school, so I hid behind the brick wall on the North side so I could listen in.

"Listen, you little, grubby moron. If you say anything to him about what we did, I'll fucking kill you." I heard a voice say.

"I-I didn't. I swear!"

That was Kenny's voice. I quickly looked beyond the wall, warily, and saw Clyde had Kenny grabbed up by the collar of his shirt. Eric, Token and Tweak were standing there, egging Clyde on. After that, Clyde turned Kenny around and held his arm high behind his back, causing Kenny to flinch and grimace in pain. Clyde pushed him up against the brick wall to the East side of the building, and to my horror, he started to grind on him, sexually, as he shoved Kenny's head into the rough bricks with his free hand.

"You like that, you little faggot ass? If you say anything about it to him, I'll fuck you so hard you won't be able to walk straight." Clyde said threateningly, in a morbid voice.

I could see tears in Kenny's eyes as Clyde thrusts into his backside, he was really pushing into him. Although they were both completely clothed, it had to be incomparably humiliating to have something like that done to him, especially in front of his classmates. Clyde then slipped his hand from Kenny's arm to the front of his jeans and grabbed the crotch area, earning a whimper from Kenny. Continuing to press himself against Kenny, hard, I could see him squeezing the front of Kenny's pants. Kenny was gritting his teeth as tears dripped, one down each cheek.

"You gonna get hard, you little bitch? You think I'm hot?" Clyde laughed, cruelly. "Oh my God, the little freak is hot for me!"

Their laughing was driving a splint into my heart. I was about to lose my mind and run over, but Clyde let go of the front of his pants. He backed up a little and shoved Kenny face-first into the brick wall, tripping him at the same time.

"You disgust me." Clyde spat, narrowing his eyes and brushing himself off, as if Kenny were covered in dirt or something.

Clyde laughed and walked away with who I recognized as Token Black, Eric Cartman and Tweek Tweak. Kenny, with a new scrape on his face, slumped down to the ground with his knees up to his chest and laid his head on his arms. I could tell he was crying, which was really unlike him, from what I've experienced. I wasn't really sure if I should approach him or not. All I knew was that watching Clyde do that.. Disgusting, horrible.. I just wanted to kill him. I shook my head a few times and walked over like I hadn't seen anything. It took me a few minutes to feel like I could control the angry shaking in my chest. I walked up to him and sighed, putting on my best actor voice.

"Kenny, what's wrong, dude?" I asked, kneeling down to him.

His head shot up and he wiped his face, blood and tears smeared onto the sleeve of his jacket.

"Y-You didn't see anything, did you?" He asked, with a sob, and batted at the mess on his face.

I shook my head, lying, "No, what do you mean, what happened?"

"Nothing." He said quickly, "I just- A lot of guys here don't really like me."

I didn't ask why. It was obvious to me that it was a hate crime. Everyone in the town must know about how we were before, since I don't remember us really being private about kissing when we were kids. God, it must have been agonizing, everyone knowing you're gay and being the only one who is. In a town like this, being different is wrong. You have to go with the flow, or you're a rock in the river.

"Come on, Ken, let's get you cleaned up." I said, tugging the arm of his hoodie.

He nodded and headed into the school with me. There was a men's restroom at this end of the hall, so just a few feet into the hall and we were there. I was glad to see no one was in there, since us being seen together was probably not going to help the situation. Kenny sat down on a sink and I grabbed a bunch of paper towels, dabbing them in the tiny stream of water from the sink. I swear, this school is jank for being made over only a few years ago. I started dabbing the blood on his cut away. He also had a few superficial scrapes by his eye, from being pushed up against the bricks. He stared down at my shirt for awhile, but I lifted his chin and look him in the eye for the rest of the time. When I was done wiping off the rest of the cut, I tossed the towel in the trash and looked him in the eyes.

"Clyde is a bully, and a jerk." I said, regretting that I just let on that I saw what happened, "Just stick with me from now on."

He blushed, looking down in embarrassment. I looked him over and realized just how handsome he really is when he took care of himself. His ear-length blonde hair was soft and not greasy. He was wearing a tight, black band t-shirt that read "Stealing Dana" in white letters, a pair of semi-tight jeans and his hi-tops. Although without his hoodie on, you could see all of the recent cuts, but I even found _that _beautiful about him, strangely. I wanted to look and dress more like him. We were about the same size, both thin and average height, and we both had relatively feminine features. Kenny was the smaller of the two of us, just in general. But I loved his tiny face, and his thin arms. His.. Flat stomach.

He blushed as I looked him over, "Take a picture."

We both laughed a little and he hopped off the sink. I was happy to see his mood improve so much. I wanted to be there for him just like this from now on. The only thing that was holding me back was my suspicion that he was keeping something from me, but I realized that if he was, it was by threat. Had Clyde been threatening him like that this whole time? The thought of it pissed me off.

The whole way back, Kenny and I chatted about all kinds of things. I loved the way he walked, with his arms folded behind his head and his eyes closed. I really wanted to see him like this all the time. He was so at ease. I could still see the hurt in his eyes when he looked at me, though. Somewhere in there, he was hurting, and that made me hurt. But on the outside, he was happy, and that's better than no emotion at all.

We got to my house and I invited him in, I knew my mom had Jazz Tap tonight and my dad was out for late game, so no one was going to be home until at least seven. We both kicked off our shoes and headed up to my room. I closed the door and turned to see him sitting on my bed. I took a seat by him and smiled.

"Craig, what exactly did you see earlier?" He asked, lifting a knee up to his chest and laying his head on it.

I frowned, "Well, all of it."

He sighed and fidgeted.

"But I don't think any less of you for it, Ken. You need to know that. Clyde is an asshole." I said, standing up and looking out the window.

Kenny paused, biting his lip.

"Is it wrong.. That.. I was actually aroused by it.. but I hated it at the same time?" He asked me, that one blank look on his face as he stared off into the corner of my room.

I walked over to him and sat back down on the bed.

"You weren't aroused by him, you were naturally aroused by the action, Kenny. It's not something you have a choice in, it's just a natural instinct to like that kind of friction."I explained, caressing his face, "Like when I touched you before, the only difference is how you feel about it mentally."

He shrugged, ".. I'm glad you're so good at explaining stuff, Craig. When he was doing that.. Stuff.. Part of the reason I was so upset is because he knew my body liked it.."

God, I need to hold my shit together. I am seriously unprepared for this kind of conversation, and just thinking about Clyde pressed against Kenny like that was making me feel sick to my stomach.

"And he _laughed_ at me, because I was.." Kenny continued, starting to sound upset.

Hearing the anguish in his voice, the agony, the embarrassment.. It made me want to kill that mother fucker. Seriously, right now, I could reach into his chest and pull out his beating heart with my bare hands, I swear.

"Kenny, what that prick thinks about you doesn't mean anything. You and I both know you didn't want or ask for what he did, and that's what matters." I said, grabbing him by the face, "I don't want anyone else to put their hands on you like that, but me."

I looked away, very obviously, but unintentionally angry. I could feel my face was hot from the uncomfortable, unpleasant and slightly embarrassing conversation we were having. Talking about anyone touching Kenny, even me, would make me uncomfotable, especially talking about it to him. I had never been possessive before, I even took pride in not being the jealous type, but I guess that's because no one had ever tried to take or hurt something that I wanted, and I wanted Kenny. I wanted him, all of him, and I didn't want anyone else to ever have him in a compromising position like that.

".. You want to touch me like that..?" Kenny asked, biting his lip.

He didn't always bite his lip, but when he did..

"Well, not without your permission, so not exactly like that.." I said awkwardly, rubbing the back of my neck.

Kenny was quiet for a few seconds, and I was dying to know what was going on inside his head. Probably more than he cared to explain. I got back up from my bed and walked across the room to my callendar. Two days until the exams and here I was, oggling Kenny. I decided it was worth it. Graduation was only three months away, once we were back from break. I was excited, because once school was over, I could spend more time With Kenny. I hated how much my world tended to revolve around him, sometimes. I'd just sit up in my room all day, without him.

I felt a pair of arms wrap around me, and two hands running under my shirt, up my stomach, onto my chest. His hands were soft, but frim, running up my abs and onto my pecs. I just imagined them running downward. I wanted so badly for those hands to.. It was killing me. I turned around and looked him in the eyes.

"Ken, you're killing me." I said, honestly, "It's taking all my self control not to just.."

I made a a gesture towards his body and let out a disgruntled groan. He smiled and chucked a bit, even though he knew I was completely serious. I had never touched anyone.. Anywhere "fun". I hadn't grinded on anyone, or even kissed someone's neck. Seriously, this whole thing is extremely new to me. All I've ever done is kiss anyone, and I wasn't so sure that Kenny was as inexperienced as me, which scared me. I was afraid I wouldn't please him, or maybe he was just as inexperienced and I would make him uncomfortable. I just didn't want to mess anything up.

He looked down at my shirt and sighed, "I don't want you to have self-control.."

I could sense that he was disappointed that I wasn't trying to jump his bones. Coming from a guy who "wasn't gay" I thought it was kind of humerous, to be honest. I could tell he really wanted me to ravage him, but I just wanted to spend time with him, hold him, kiss him, _love_ him. I didn't want to have one crazy night, I wanted to have many romantic nights, but also wanted desperately to please him. He turned around and started heading back to the bed.

I fought with myself about it, but I grabbed him by the hips and wrapped my arms around him. I turned him toward my desk and pressed him against it. He put his hands on my desk and braced himself as I thrust against him. He giggled a little,which made me blush. I was trying to be tough, dammit. I then turned him toward my wall and strongly pushed him against it and roughly ground into him, this time he let out a small gasp and pushed back against me. I was beginning to really like this feeling.

"I-is this okay..?" I asked, starting to feel the blood flow to my genitals increase.

"Yes.." He panted, his eyes were closed and he was blushing profusely.

I relaxed a bit, knowing he was genuinely enjoying the roughness of my nature and not insulted by it. I heard him gasp and moan a bit, and realized I was now completely hard, pressing my length onto him. The thought of him feeling me hard against him made me blush, and I let a quiet moan escape my lips. I found myself wondering what it would feel like to do.. More. Kenny relaxed a bit when I stopped thrusting, and he tuned toward me, kissing me roughly. I had never had anyone kiss me like that before. Before I knew it, I felt his palm pressing against my shaft, and I nearly yelped. At that, I withdrew my kiss and he pulled his hand back, hesitantly.

"I'm sorry, is that too far..?" He asked, biting his lip.

I still felt my chest pounding, "N-no, I just wasn't expecting.."

At that, he knelt in front of me and undid my pants, quickly. I kind of wanted to stop, but I didn't at the same time. This kind of change was just scary for me, and this being my first time, I was as nervous as I could possibly be. Regardless of how nervous I was, I was as hard as humanly possible, and with Kenny knealing in front of me, I could feel it pulsating. I felt him unzip my jeans, and pull them down a little, and with that, my manhood revealed itself in full glory. He looked at it for a second.

"I-I've never done this before," He said, taking me by surprise, "I.. I want to.."

Without finishing his thought, his lips slipped over the head, and I felt a tingling sensation come over my entire body. He ran his tongue in circles over the lip, and pressed his tongue against the slit, as if he were trying to insert his tongue into me. I never would have known it could feel so amazing. He pushed it into his mouth as far as he could, and I nearly lost it right then, but he pulled it out of his mouth enough to slide his tongue over it again. I was shaking and my hands were trembling, I felt like I was going to lose my mind. Without a second thought, I put my hands on Kenny's head and began to thrust into his mouth. Kenny rested his hands on my hips, urging me to continue, so I did. The feeling of the inside of his mouth was warm and wet, and tight. I couldn't help myself, I released into his mouth with a loud moan, and shook through my entire orgasm. After I finished, I sank back onto my bed and panted. I watched Kenny slink back onto his legs and wipe his mouth, licking his lips.

"I-it. It tastes so bitter." He said, blushing, breathing heavily.

I heard someone coming up the stairs, and I nearly had a heart attack. Kenny has a raging boner, and my pants are at my knees. I heard the footsteps drawing closer to my room, and I pushed Kenny into my closet, hard, without thinking twice. My closet didn't have a door, so I pushed him to the far back, behind some clothes. He hit the wall with a thud, and I heard something fall, but I covered his mouth and held still, hoping whoever it was hadn't heard any of the thudding. We were both leaning back against the far wall of my closet, silently.

"Craig, are you home? What was that noise?" I heard my mom say, walking into my room.

After looking around, she made a "hm" noise. She folded a few shirts and a pair of jeans for me, set them on my bed and walked out. I waited to hear that she had gone downstairs before we moved, so we stood there in silence until I heard her footsteps on the stairs. After she went downstairs, I let out a sigh and dropped my hand from Kenny's face. Just after that, I heard the noise of splitting wood, and found myself flying backward.

I landed on my back, with Kenny on top of me, and coughed. The dust was overwhelming, suffocating. After I stopped coughing and the dust settled, I opened my eyes to see that I was looking up at my closet, from an opening in the back of it. It was really eerie seeing my closet from this angle. I felt like I was in a hole. I sat up and looked around, but it was so dark that I couldn't see anything. Kenny coughed a few more times and looked around, then looked at me.

"Dude, what is this?" He asked, tears in his eyes from coughing.

"I don't know.." I said, standing up, and blushing as I pulled my pants all the way up.

I brushed myself off and offered my hand to Kenny, pulling him up. We walked out of the closet, and I looked back at it, briefly. I looked toward my door, then back at Kenny. He was still hard. I looked back at the door again, then I closed it and locked it. I knelt in front of Kenny, earning a blush from him.

"You don't have to.. Your mom.." He said quietly, as I unzipped his pants.

I did say anything back to him, I wanted to make him feel as amazing as he made me feel. I pulled his skinny jeans down a bit and pulled his manhood from his boxers. I blushed at the length of it. Kenny bucked at the touch of my hands, which made my stomach tingle. Before I continued, I pulled his jeans and boxers off and rested my elbows on his knees. I was determined to make him feel the best he had ever felt, and better. He was so hard that it nearly made me hard, and would have if I hadn't just had an orgasm. I lifted his dick with my hands and bit my lip. I looked up at him to see that he was blushing, and his shoulders were shaking. I licked the tip of the head, still unsure that he wanted me to, but the way he bucked told me that he definitely did. At that, I slid my lips past his head and pushed his length into my mouth as far as I could, earning a stifled moan from Kenny. Hearing him moan just made me want to do more to please him. Over all, I wanted to be his first, for everything. I wanted him to feel me all over his body, deep inside of him, but I wouldn't go that far right now. When we had our first time, I wanted it to be special.

I continued to push him in and out of my mouth, I thought he was going to lose his mind the way he moaned. I still wanted to do more to please him. I paused, getting up and pushing him down into a laying position on my bed, then pressed my mouth against his hard, pulsing manhood again. This time, I licked my finger and pressed it against his opening, earning a gasp from Kenny. I paused, hoping I wasn't entering territory that I shouldn't.

"N-no, don't stop, please.." He nearly begged, "I'll lose my mind if you stop now.."

I blushed and smiled at his weakness for me. I continued more vigorously than before, shoving him into my mouth as fast as I could, and entering his opening for the first time. He bucked and gasped at this, then bit his lip. I slid my tongue up and down his rock hard member while I slid in and out of his tight.. Wet, h-hot.. Just thinking about it, I was hard again. What made this even better, what made this just absolutely amazing, his how much I cared about him.

"Craig.." He panted, looking up at me, "I- I want you now.."

I knew I couldn't do that yet. I wanted to, so badly that it actually hurt, but instead I just continued. I went as fast and as hard I I could, eventually inserting another finger into him. I kept pushing him deep into my mouth as he arched his back, and he exploded into my mouth as he shook with pleasure. He let out a soft moan, and panted hard after I withdrew my fingers from him and sat up, swallowing his cum. He's right.. It was bitter.

After a few minutes, he sat up and grabbed his boxers, putting them on, then he looked at me. My dark brown hair was a total mess, I was covered in sweat and I smelled like sex. I blushed at the thought of having his scent on me. We had both been each other's first everything so far, and I was looking forward to more "firsts" in the future. He got dressed and pushed me down on the bed, pressing fleeting kisses to my neck and chest, then climbed on me and continued to kiss me all over my face, making me laugh. I looked up at him. Even in the setting sunlight, near darkness, I could see those icy eyes.

After a few more minutes of kissing and caressing, I let him out of my house. I kissed him once more on the front porch and walked back inside. I was kind of surprised to see my mom sitting on the couch. How long had she been there? Clearly not long enough to see anything, since she just smiled and waved me on, to continue watching her show.

Thank God. I'm not even close to ready to talk to her about this.

I walked back up to my room and sat on my bed, running a hand through my hair and making a face at the sweat. I really gave everything I could to pleasing Kenny tonight, and I would do it again. At this point, I was trying not to think back on it. Now I know that nothing could beat looking down and seeing his mouth on me, so the last thing I wanted was to get turned on when he's not around.

I looked toward the hole in my closet and sighed. Just another mess I have to clean up tomorrow. I was too warn out to take a shower, so I just changed out of my clothes and into some basketball shorts, then I slid into bed and immediately fell straight to sleep.

It was the first night in ages that I didn't dream at all.


	14. Dear Mom,

_"Craig?" I heard a young girl's voice._

I shot up from my bed, gasping. I looked over to my closet, and I felt like there were a pair of eyes staring at me from the dark space I had left untouched since the day before. I wasn't really sure how to go about exploring it, I wasn't sure about the stability of the floorboards, or if the walls were finished. All in all, I just wasn't sure how safe it would be. I had plans to grab a flashlight and look into it, but for some reason, I was dreading it. In my head, I was making up all kinds of excuses not to go into that hidden room. At the end of it all, I just felt kind of stupid for worrying about it, because it was probably just a lot of dust and junk.

I laid back down and thought over a lot of things for a long time. It was just three in the morning, far too early to get up. I was excited to talk to Kenny today, because I wanted to ask him if he'd walk to and from school with me from now on. Usually I loved my alone time, just listening to my music and ignoring the existence of everyone else. Lately, though, I just wanted to see to it that Kenny wasn't treated wrong by anyone while I wasn't around. Typically he was apthetic and sarcastic, the kind of guy who would be popular, but for some reason everyone just either ignored or walked on him. I guess walking on someone is easy when they don't like themselves enough to stop you.

That's the thing about Kenny though, he just kind of didn't care. Well, he has the last couple of days, but only when it came to me. When it comes to anyone else, he has a shrug-it-off kind of attitude. Mean or nice, didn't matter. I guess being on a lot of drugs all the way through high school probably didn't help him when it came to seeming like he didn't care. I loved how he looked though, even with a vacant expression. He has a blonde fohawk that's grown in, and is always dressed in black and gray band-T's, and with his dark jeans and hi-tops, he looked like a regular stud. I guess that's why he's my best friend though, because I like him. Although, at this point, I think he's more than my best friend.

I haven't heard a lot from Stan lately. A few days ago he shot me a text about going to the winter festival in a few days, but I hadn't messaged back yet, he might think I'm giving him the cold shoulder. Honestly, at the time, I was too busy kissing Kenny. I should really focus more on other things, especially school, but I just wanted to be around for him all the time. When he wasn't next to me, he could be doing anything, doing drugs, or hurting himself, or getting harrassed by Clyde. I wanted to be around to protect him. Losing part of my social life or my grades was far less painful to me than seeing him hurt any more than he already has.

Suddenly, my phone ripped me from my thoughts. I wasn't used to getting phone calls, everyone just sent texts. Who would be calling this early?

"Hello..?" I asked, already hearing background breathing.

"C-C-Craig..?" I heard Kenny's voice from the other line, startling me.

I sat up straight, "Kenny, what's wrong?"

"I-I'm.." He sighed, "I'm scared. Clyde and Stan came by and were looking in all of my windows and I heard a crashing sound outside, and I don't know if they're still here or not and-"

He was talking so fast I could barely understand him, "I'm coming over."

I heard a light protest before I hung up the phone. Why was Stan with Clyde? I was rushing so much I nearly forgot to zip my jeans as I quietly snuck down the stairs and out the door. The cold air hit my like a brick, I never realized how cold it could be this late at night. I didn't listen to music on the way there, so it was far more creepy than usual. I could hear every twig, bunny searching for a late night snack, I could even hear the television on as I passed Kyle's house.

After about fifteen minutes, I could see Kenny's house and I put my hood up. At a distance, it didn't look like anyone was home, so I figured Clyde and Stan had left. Although, I was a little surprised I didn't run into them on my way there, so I was still cautious. I thought back and realized I dhould have brought some kind of self-defense, but it was too late now. I walked up the stairs to Kenny's door and walked inside without knocking.

"Hey Ken, I'm here." I said, looking around.

It was pitch black inside his house, but I still recognized his figure as he walked toward me.

"Can we go to your place..? I hate putting you out like this, but they're still outside." He said, looking back into the dark hallway.

I nodded and tugged his sleeve, but as soon as we turned toward the door, I felt my heart skip a beat. Standing in the doorway was one person, and I recognized the physique to be that of Clyde. He had his arms crossed and he was leaning against the door frame. Even in a circumstance like this, he was acting like he owned the place. I looked around Kenny's bare living room for any kind of protection, but it was so dark that even if there were a weapon, I wasn't going to find it.

"Clyde, this is a big step from putting a razor in my back pack strap, don't you think?" I said, trying not to let the fear in my voice get out of control, "Seriously dude, you're being freaky."

He walked in a few steps and I could see his face better, "Coming from a freak, that doesn't mean a lot."

So this is what Clyde was really like. It seemed so wrong, hearing his voice sound like that, and hearing him have this pompous attitude, like he hadn't a care for anyone in the world. At this moment, I felt like he was capable of anything, if he could fool me into believing he was a decent person. My only question at this point is, where is Stan? It's better to keep that bit of imformation to myself. I had a feeling that Stan was hiding something from me, and this only backs my feeling.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, taking a step closer to Kenny.

He chuckled, "Just enjoying the view."

He made a gesture to Kenny's trailer and scoffed. I was starting to get ticked off. Even in this situation, he was making cracks about Kenny not being well off. It caught me off guard how small Kenny was right now. He had shrunk back like a small child, cowering in my shadow. It pissed me off how much control Clyde had over him.

"You need to leave." I said, pointing a finger at him, my anger showing in my voice.

I could see his smile even in the dark, "Fine. Since little bitch had to call back-up, I suppose I will."

He waved me off, tauntingly, and walked out the door. I heard him walk down the steps and waited for his foot steps to fade. What would have happened if I hadn't shown up? It hurt my chest just thinking about it. Since the lock on Kenny's door was weak, he could have easily slipped in here and done whatever he pleased.

"Kenny, get your clothes, you're staying with me from now on." I said, not even considering that my mom would protest, "I'm serious, I don't want you to live like this anymore."

He looked at his feet, then looked around his trailer, ".. Okay."

And that's all he said. Honestly, if someone asked me to leave my home, everything I knew, I'd need more than a few seconds to agree to it. I probably wouldn't agree, I'd decline. Looking around the place, though, I could understand why he wouldn't want to be here anyway. No one was ever home, and there was water damage on almost every window and some of the walls, there was never anything to eat, his showerhead only had a few working spouts, and the washer and drier were both in need of repair. He was practically rotting in this place. He walked back out with a backpack, a blanket and a shoe box. Just then, I realized how little Kenny had to his name. He looked back toward his room and stopped.

"Wait, I'm going to leave my mom a note, Craig. I don't want her to worry." He sounded excited, but kind of pensive.

After a few minutes, we headed toward my house. I carried the shoe box and he carried everything else. He was quiet the entire way there, which I could understand. He probably had a lot on his mind. Kenny's parents wouldn't make a fuss out of him leaving, even if he was still a minor. As far as they were concerned, it was just one less mouth to feed, and with a new baby coming, that was important to them. His parents were a lot different than mine. My mom had trouble letting me spend the night at other people's houses, even tonight I had to sneak just to get out and go to Kenny's. I guess I understand though, she is my mom. Not to mention, I'd much rather have my overprotective parents than Kenny's careless ones, even if they were nice.

We got to my house, and I told Kenny to wait outside while I checked things out. By this time, it was five in the morning and my dad would be leaving to hunt early game. I walked into the living room and looked around, but I didn't see anyone. In fact, everything was still pretty much silent. Believing that everyone was either gone or still asleep, I signaled for Kenny to come inside. The darkness only made me realize how tired I was. I could only imagine how tired Kenny would be, since he'd been up longer than I had, worrying about Clyde. We made our way up to my room and I closed and locked the door. Kenny still looked really uncertain about everything. He was really quiet, and not being his normal self with me. It seemed like he was trying to hide the doubt.

"Kenny, I know this is a big deal, but I want you to know that you can always go back to your parent's house." I said to him, putting a hand on his head, "This isn't irreversable."

That put him at ease a bit. His shoulders relaxed, and he slipped off his hoodie. He looked up at me, as if he were waiting for instructions.

"Make yourself at home. I'll talk to my mom about this tomorrow." I said, unzipping my jeans, "You can sleep in my bed tonight."

It's times like this, I was glad I had a lock on my door. I was actually really excited about sleeping in the same bed as Kenny. I was excited about the possibility of sleeping next to him every night. But that brought my mom knowing about us into play. My mom had always been an accepting woman, and I doubted she would protest to him living with us as long as he helped out, but her knowing about my sexuality was an entirely different story. She and I had never discussed dating, or sex, or even me finding someone attractive. We had always been really quiet about that, especially since I never found anyone attractive until now.

He slipped out of his jeans and I tossed him a pair of my plaid pajama pants to sleep in. Both of us were shirtless, and I looked over to see him sliding under my covers. I could get used to seeing that. After I turned off my light, I took my place right next to him. He hesitated a bit, we had never cuddled before, after all. After a few minutes, he relaxed and nuzzled his face against my chest. I was going to sleep easy, knowing he was next to me and safe.

_"Freak." _

_ I heard the word, but it was drug out and distorted, I could barely make out what it was, until the very end of the word. I was looking down, and I could see wood chips. Children were laughing in the background, and I could hear the squealing of swings. I looked up from my feet to see a young boy, resembling Clyde. He was surrounded by kids without faces, and they were all laughing at me. He said something else, but the words didn't come out of his faceless figures laughed in response, just the same. _

_ As soon as I closed my eyes, I was somewhere else. I could hear crackling, and I could smell smoke. Beyond that, I could hear rustling leaves, and I could smell the cold winter air. I could hear someone talking, but it sounded like they were under water. I could make out that it was an aggravated conversation between two or three people, but the words were mumbled and muffled. I opened my eyes, and I could see everyone. I could see Clyde, and I could see Token, and Cartman, and Kyle. Clyde was gesturing to me, and yelling. I saw Stan across from me and my heart started to beat faster. Stan. I saw Tonya. I saw Kenny. I turned to look beside me. Suddenly I heard a dull metal thud and I was falling backward. I hit the ground behind me and I looked up to see an old, rotting tree stump. Clyde was standing behind it with a shovel, and he was pointing and yelling at me, but I couldn't make out a word he was saying. Looking back at me with her hand to her mouth was a young girl with long, strawberry-blonde hair._

_ Mary. That's Mary._

_ Clyde turned toward her, and she got up from the stump, looking for an escape route. Before she could think of anything, Clyde launched himself at her and grabbed her by both arms. At that moment, everything was drowned out, like a television losing reception. Before I knew it, I was in complete darkness. There was a lot of pressure on my face, and I wasn't sure why. I was confused. I tried to lift my head, but there was resistance, as if someone had their foot on it and holding it down. I tried lifting it backward, and with a sticking noise, like pulling a sticker off of wrapping paper, I lifted my head. I had been disoriented. I hadn't realized I was face down. I coughed once or twice, and rolled over. My face was tingling, it felt wrong. I batted at my face with a gloved hand, and it felt like I was brushing over a new wound, like I had no skin and I was touching bare, pulsating muscle. I couldn't feel my fingers, or my toes, or anything else. I couldn't see, so I got up and staggered in a random direction. After a few minutes, I tried to open my eyes, but I couldn't. It felt like someone had tied my eyelashes together and I could feel them pulling, but they wouldn't open. _

_ After batting at my face and stumbling around for what seemed like forever, one of my eyes opened with a sickening, wet clicking noise, like someone flicking water.I was in the woods, and there was new snow.I looked back at the trail I had made to see that I was walking from an old, beat-up shed. It was all wood with a rickety, rusted tin roof. I continued on my way, trying to make out some kind of navigation, but I was trying to keep my face down, shielding it from the cold._

_ Eventually, I made it to an old, dirt road. I walked on the road for ten minutes, twenty minutes, thirty minutes, until I suddenly saw a pair of bright lights headed in my direction. The lights, an old, limited edition Grand Prix, stopped in front of me. I heard a woman gasp and several muttered questions directed toward me, but I couldn't think. I felt so much pain and tingling that I couldn't open my mouth, or even think of words that would inspire me to open it to begin with. I looked in the side mirror of the car to see my face covered in dried, red blood. One of my eyes was open, the other shut. The blood was dry, and had almost a shine to it in the light. I lifted my hand to my face and tried to wipe it off, only to find that it was completely frozen to my skin._

_ The whole time, I thought it was snow. I thought it was snow._

I shot up and immediately threw myself over the side of my bed, feeling like I was going to wretch. Instead, I heard an odd, trickling noise. I lifted my hand to my face and brushed my nose to find that it was bleeding. Suddenly, my head felt like it was going to explode. I grabbed my head and yelled, awakening the sleeping Kenny to my left. It felt like my brain was going to explode out of my skull.

"Craig?" I heard my mom calling from the outside of my door.

A sudden sense of alarm took over me, as Kenny and I were in our boxers in my bed.

"I'm fine. I'm going back to bed, mom." I said, exhaling hard through my nose and jumping out of my bed to grab something to hold to it.

I didn't hear her move for a minute, but eventually I heard her foot steps toward her bedroom across the hall. I grabbed a dirty, black t-shit and held it to my nose. I sat on my bed with my head tilted backward, Kenny sitting next to me. We didn't say anything. I think Kenny knew I had another dream, I almost felt like he was afraid to know what it was about.

My nose stopped bleeding, and I tossed the shirt aside, kissing Kenny on the cheek and throwing on some pants. I needed to talk to my mom, about Kenny and about a couple of other important things.I unlocked my door and walked across the hall to my mother's room to see that she was awake, just reading a book.

"Oh, good morning Craig." She said, closing her book, "You never come in here, what's the occasion?"

I sat down at the end of the bed and made an unsure face.

"Well mom, I have a really good friend that doesn't have anywhere to go, and I know you weren't looking for any company, but I'd never ask you if it wasn't really important to me.." I said, looking at her, then at the floor, "He really means a lot to me, and I wanted to see if it would be okay for him to live here for awhile, even if it's just until after graduation, then he and I can just get a place together."

She sighed and set her book on the night stand, "I know you wouldn't ask if it wasn't important, so as long as he helps out, he can stay in the spare bedroom."

I got up, kissed her on the cheek and smiled, "You don't know how much this means to me, but there's something else I need you to know, mom."

She looked up at me, "What is it, Craig?"

I wasn't sure what to say to make it any less.. What it is, so I just came out with it.

"I'm not straight." I said, and suddenly I felt my heartbeat start increasing.

She just kept smiling at me, which made me feel incredibly awkward, "You know, I know you don't remember this, but when you were younger, you had a special friend that I knew you were into." She shook her head slowly and chuckled a little, "You two went everywhere together, I think his name was Kenny, if I remember correctly.

"Mom, that's who I want to live here." It actually just kind of came out of my mouth.

She just kind of looked at me, not smiling, "Are you sure about this?"

I looked back at her, very seriously, "I am more sure about this than anything else in my life."

That look on her face told me that she knew this would reveal things to me that she never intended on telling me, but at the same time, I felt like this is why we moved back to South Park. I feel like my mom knew something, that something big was about to happen, but I wouldn't know the extent of that until later.


	15. Sheds are Just One-Room Houses

**Author's note: I've decided that I will finish this story on January 15th. I figured it's appropriate, since that's about how much of the story is left, and it's a year's anniversary of when I started it. Enjoy!**

Later that night, I was studying by myself in my room. Kenny was downstairs with my mom, doing things around the house. I could tell that my mom was making an enormous effort to make Kenny feel welcome, even though she had her own drawbacks about having another person in the house. Otherwise, she seems to already be adjusting. I was happy to see him socializing with her, because she looked happier with someone to talk to. I guess it only makes sense. Kenny's parents never really cared to talk to him, and my mom never really had anyone to talk to. My dad and I were always so busy with our lives, that we often took her for granted. I was happy to bring someone into her life that would appreciate everything she did.

That said, I had my own issues to deal with. After that dream, I was experiencing some trauma. I knew what happened now, well most of it, and I was having trouble being myself. I knew Kenny could sense it, and he was trying to give me my space. I appreciated it. I knew that Clyde had something to do with that girl's death, and I knew he was threatening everyone close to me, in fear that they would inspire memories to uncover. From what I gathered, we were all at a campfire when it happened, and we were all witnesses. I was the only one who couldn't remember the details. I was curious about a lot of things. How did she die, exactly? Was she found, was anyone punished? Was everyone punished? Why did Clyde hit me with a shovel?

Oh, that's right. He hit me with a shovel. What an asshole.

I'm still not sure why he even hit me. From what I remember, he and I weren't the one's arguing. In fact, I wasn't saying anything. Thinking about it was getting frustrating. At this point, I wasn't even studying, I was just poking around at a sheet of trigonomitry equasions with a pencil. The exams were tomorrow, and I hadn't had more than an hour of studying. Honestly, I should still be just fine, but I won't be at my prime by any means.

"Hey Craig, you busy?" I heard Kenny from my door way.

I smiled and put my pencil down, "No way, why?"

He kicked the door shut and sat in my lap, facing me. He kissed my neck and laid his head on my shoulder. He almost seemed like he was pouting, he even sighed and hid his face in my neck. I wrapped my arms around him and closed my eyes. I could get used to this. I understood why he would feel a little needy right now, there were a lot of changes for him all at the same time, it must be frustrating. I sat there, leaning back in my seat and enjoying being close to him for next to twenty minutes, not saying a word. He stirred a bit, and pressed his lips to my neck again, only this time he was twirling his tongue in circles on my skin. I felt tingling from my waist to my feet. Despite my body's response, I really just wanted to hold him tonight. Don't get me wrong, the thought of his body was driving me crazy, but I just wanted to feel his skin on mine, under some warm blankets.

"Hey Ken, I'm pretty beat, you wanna get some sleep?" I asked, running my hand down his side, "I want you to come with.. I'm feeling cuddly."

He smiled and got up from my lap, "Sure, just let me shower first, I feel gross."

I smiled and watched him walk out. I'd taken a shower earlier, so I wasn't feeling gross. All I really did all day was sit at my desk and think. I took off my shirt and changed into some pajama pants, made my bed and folded the edge back a bit, fluffed my pillows and brushed my hair so it didn't get too ridiculous. After last night, I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to sleep without Kenny to wrap my arms around again. Having someone in your bed with you is one of the most unbelievably magical feelings, and I'd been missing out on it for far too long. For once in my life, it didn't feel lie something was missing. It was a nice break.

It only took him maybe fifteen minutes to get back to my room, he was really adorable with his hair wet. After drying off a bit more, he took his place in my bed, next to me. My bed was only a single, but it held us pretty well, especially with how close we were anyway. We really even managed to have about six inches of extra space collectively. The only issue about it so far was that Kenny turns into a furnace the second he falls asleep. Sometimes I think he's going to melt away.

I ran my hand through his hair and pressed his head to my chest. He wrapped is arms around me, and I sighed. I know I said I wanted to sleep, but now that we're laying down, my head wouldn't shut up. Having him so close to me, skin to skin, just made me want to be closer. Kenny was always thouching me, or kissing on me. I knew he wanted to be intimate with me, I just wasn't good with that kind of thing, and despite his obvious arousal, he wasn't pushy about it.

His skin was so soft. His hair was soft. He was just soft in general. Thinking about it was starting to drive me crazy. I ran my hand up his neck, earning a shiver and fidget from him.

"Hn, Craig, quit it." He chuckled, nuzzling my chest, "Starting the car without driving it is unfair."

Oh, I wanted to drive it, I just didn't know how. Ultimately, I decided against starting anything. I just wasn't ready to go all the way yet. After a little while, I started to doze off.

The next morning was the first morning I woke up without feeling sick or hot in about a month. It was almost surreal. I woke up facing a messy head of blonde hair and thin shoulders barely covered by my plaid blankets. He was facing away from me, and I could hear him breathing. I ran my hand down his back and he muttered some weird ramble. I smiled to myself and looked around my room. His jeans were on my floor, and his back pack was next to my desk by mine. The exams were today, and I was anxious. Kenny had studied a bit, which was extremely unusual for him, but I was worried for him. After all, he hadn't been the best student, and I wanted him to graduate. I'm surprised he's kept up with everyone this far.

I got up from my bed, trying not to wake Kenny. It was only about five, so he could sleep in another hour or so. I put a shirt on and looked down at him, caressing his cheek. He is so beautiful. Giving him a kiss on the cheek, I headed out of the room. I walked down the stairs, past the living room and into the kitchen to make something for us to eat. God, this is my first time actually cooking something in the kitchen. My mom was usually really good about having a meal on the table at the same time three times a day. While she more than likely planned on making us breakfast, I wanted something specific.

My mom came down the stairs a few minutes after I had started poaching the eggs and I could hear her standing in the doorway. I turned towards her and waved, then continued cooking. I heard her make a "hm" noise and walk into the living room. The thing is, I know exactly how Kenny likes his food cooked in the morning. He likes his eggs poached, three eggs and three slices of toast, with a cup of grape juice. He hates orange juice and despises milk. Oddly enough, he doesn't like bacon, and sausage makes him feel gross, so he only likes ham with his breakfast. He doesn't like many fruits, but he loves apples, and he likes to dip them in plain sugar. I felt ridiculous knowing all of this, because I didn't remember when I obtained the information.

I heard Kenny coming down the stairs and finished cooking, putting out three plates on the table. My mom followed him and they both took a seat at the table. Kenny looked things over and smiled.

"I don't know how you can remember all of this." He said, chuckling, "It's had to be at least five years since we talked about brekfast food at all."

My mom shot me a smile, "I've never seen you cook before, Craig. You're a pretty decent chef, if I do say so myself."

I smiled and enjoyed the rest of the meal. I think this is the first time I've seen Kenny finish a meal, my mom has cooked three or four dishes for us so far, and he always leaves something on the plate. This was my first time cooking food for my mom, it was nice seeing her off of her feet.

We finished up and I headed out with Kenny. It might be winter, but there wasn't a cloud in the sky. The morning sun was rising over the trees, casting a shadow in front of my house. It was beautiful. It had snowed again last night, so Kenny and I were leaving fresh prints as we walked. I looked over at him, in his orange hoodie with the fur lining. I could see his blonde hair sticking out from beneath is hood. I could see his breath whisping in the cold.

Part of me was still hesitating with him. I knew he was keeping something serious from me, and even in times of joy and playfulness, part of me still knew that. The only way I was getting myself through was by telling myself that he wouldn't keep anything from me if he didn't have to, but deep down, I knew he kept some things from me for his own benefit. Everyone does that. If you took away the intention behind actions, everyone would be a liar. I just couldn't believe that someone like Kenny could be a traitor of any kind. He was so fourthcoming about information on other occasions, it was hard for me to believe he would just lie for no reason. So I knew that if he was lying, he had his reasons, I just hoped they were good reasons.

Besides, I was more worried about Clyde's intentions. Any time he was around, I felt like my head was going to explode. I hadn't seen him since his creepy confrontation at Kenny's house, but I knew I would be facing him again soon, and I had a feeling it wasn't going to be good. That kid was officially on my loathing list, and for a variety of reasons. He just thinks he can take whatever he wants, whenever he wants, and that included Kenny.. And Mary. The way he lunged at her told a story by itself, I was afraid to know what he did after that. I knew he was going to be responsible for something bad happening, I just wasn't sure what.

We got to class a few minutes early and took a seat. Everyone was chatting about this or that, just a carrying on normally. I was nervous, but I was even more nervous for Kenny, who seemed pretty nonchalant, despite the fact he hadn't studied much at all. After the bell rang, I realized I didn't feel a certain set of eyes gazing me way. I looked around to see that Clyde had skipped out on exam day, which was very unlike him. Clyde was a straight-A student. He was captain of the chess club, and played seasonal baseball in a group not affiliated with the school that was primarily made up of adults. He was a go-getter, and accomplished everything he put his mind to. If he wasn't such a sadistic piece of trash, he would actually be a decent human being.

After the exam, I met up with Kenny in the hall and started to our second hour.

"Think you did alright?" I asked him, smiling.

He shrugged, "Well, I think I did, but I've been wrong before."

We both chuckled a bit and walked into our next class. I immediately knew something was off. At the front of the room, our principal, vice principal, teacher and student supervisor were in a circle talking. At first, I thought someone had done something illegal. In the beginning of the school year, someone vandalized in the cafeteria and a similar group was waiting in the next hour class. This time, when I walked in, they all looked in my direction and then back at each other. I set my back pack down on my desk and moved to take a seat, but the principal began walking in my direction.

"You're Craig Tucker, correct?" She asked me, holding out her hand.

I nodded, grasping it and shaking it, trying to silence all the negative scenarios in my head.

"I've recieved a call from your father, and he told me you should head home for the day. There has been a family emergency, and he doesn't want you to be in school right now." She said slowly and cleary, as if I was an alien.

I looked over at Kenny, then back at her, "Well, is he at home? I kind of wanted to finish my school day."

"Your father is at the South Park St. Clark hospital." She said to me, sounding like she was trying to keep me calm, when I was already perfectly calm.

As soon as she mentioned the hospital, I picked up my back pack, gave Kenny a pat on the shoulder, and walked out the door. My mom being at the hospital would have been completely normal this time of day, she's an obstitrician, but my dad? My dad hates hospitals, the only time he was ever in one was when a family member was dying and when I was born. He broke his pinky last year and even then, he wouldn't go, so I knew this was serious.

I arrived at the hospital shortly after and walked up to the front desk not really being sure of what to do. I remembered being in this hospital. I looked up at the ceiling, and I had a vision that the ceiling starting moving, as if I were running and staring up at it. Like I was on a stretcher. I looked back down at the woman behind the counter for a good five minutes before she even noticed my existence.

"What can I do for you, sir?" She asked me with a smile.

I looked around, then back at her, "Oh, I got a call from my dad at school about a family emergency. Pete and Rosa Tucker? I'm their son, Craig."

She typed something in on the computer and got a concerned look on her face, "She's in room 335B on the second floor in the resting area of the trauma ward."

Trauma ward? I felt my heart skip a beat and I left the desk without saying another word. I walked down a white, echoing hallway. Two. Three. Eventually I made my way up an elevator and onto the second floor, where I walked down some more hallways. More hallways, passing rooms of people watching television, waiting for their stay to be up. Some of them seemed pretty content, but the further down the hallway I got, the less pleased the patients seemed to be. I made my way closer to the room that my mother was being kept in, and I started to get discouraged. It almost seemed like they had delicately arranged the patients by how miserable they were. I finally made it to the door I was searching for, 335B, and looked at the door. There was a small window, but I couldn't see anything on the other side. I guess my dad had turned the lights off. I knocked twice, then turned the knob and entered.

I walked in and saw my dad sitting by her bed, in the dark. He looked like he was leaning over and resting his arm on his and, propped on his knee. I walked over to the window and pulled the blinds back enough to light the room, but not harshly. My mom had a mask on her face, and bandages around her head. It appeared as though part of her head was shaved. My dad was asleep, sitting up in the chair. I almost forgot he went to hunt late game last night, he must be tired. I walked back over to the door and lifted the clipboard out of the slot by the door and looked it over.

_Patient name: Rosa Leah Tucker_

_Patient age: 34_

_Patient height: 5'4_

_Patient weight: 136 lbs_

_Diagnosis: Car accident, severe head trauma. Surgery to alleviate swelling from brain hemorrhaging successful._

Car accident? Something about that didn't seem right. My mom hadn't been in a wreck her whole twenty years of driving. She was always careful. Since the surgery was successful, I was guessing I didn't have anything to worry about, but after skimming through the doctor's foot notes, I discovered that although the surgery was successful, my mother had yet to wake up, and they were still unsure. This sucks.

I looked at them, then I sat in a chair across the room and took out my notebook. After a good two or so hours of work, I got a text on my phone. It was from Kenny.

_ "Starke's pond. Old shack. Get here, faggot."_

I immediately felt a splint of shock roll over my body, then anger, then helplessness. I ran out the door without a second thought. This had been a diversion. This whole thing with my mom was just a set up. That no-good piece of trash was just distracting me, and I fell for it. That bastard. My question now, was how did he cause the accident? What did he do? What was he going to do? I felt a million questions playing over my mind as I sprinted past numerous nurses and out the door to the parking lot. I just kept running from there, ignoring the cold, ignoring the stabbing pain in my side.

I got to Starke's pond and stopped. This might be a mistake, or a trap or something, but at this point, it's really out of my control. The sun was just now setting over the horizon, and everything was becoming dark. I couldn't see the shack from where I was standing, but I knew the direction it was in, and I started walking through a few inches of snow to get to it. The further I walked, the darker the sky became, and I started to feel a fluttering in my chest. I started to feel isolated, cold, and I started hearing things from inside my head.

_ I heard a hushed, perverted, male whisper roll through my head like a bowling ball, "Hey, you wanna know a secret?"_

_ "I can tell you some things about boys you would have never guessed."_

_ I heard a girl's giggle, "Like what?"_

Suddenly a tearing pain ripped through my head as I continued to walk, like my brain was being pulled and stretched.

_ "Craig, how old is Lucy?" I heard a girl ask, a dog barking in the background._

_ I heard my own voice reply, "Oh, I don't know. Like seven or eight."_

_ Suddenly I could see Mary sitting on the porch next to me, a white Scotti jumping toward a fence and barking at a passerby._

I had to stop walking, the pain in my head started to get to a point that it was torture. I started pressing my fingers into my eyes, just to put pressure one a soft area in my skull. It's as if the memories were taking up tangible space in my head, and there just wasn't enough room for them. As the pain subsided, I stopped clenching my face and withdrew my hands to see that they were covered in blood. I batted at my face a few times and realized my nose was bleeding a ridiculous amount. I started coughing, because it ran down my throat and into my mouth. I spent a few minutes coughing and sputtering blood in the snow until it stopped, and I tried to wipe myself down the best I could before I continued on. Suddenly, everything became really calm in my head, and I stopped in my tracks. As sudden as the calmness came, the pain began again, with a vengeance. I hit the ground immediately, with shrieks and shrills I had never heard before.

_ From the place I was at, I started running in the direction of the cries. I could tell it was an animal by how it sounded, but I wasn't sure what type. All I knew was that something was in pain and needed my help. The grass was green and there was no snow to be seen, the sun was just setting. I could hear people laughing while the screams continued, I just kept running. I reached the source of the screams, and I stood there in shock. Four boys with sticks were beating a white Scottish Terrier, and laughing while they did it. The dog was beaten and bloody, no longer screaming, no longer yelping, but laying there. Still and stiff as ice. The boys ran off without me being able to identify them at all._

_ Lucy._

_ I could hear them all laughing. Laughing at her. Laughing at me._

I let out a scream as the visions ended, and more blood spurted from my nose. I found myself yelling not only in pain, but in anger, as I could now recall one of the most horrific acts of cruelty I ever witnessed in my childhood. I couldn't keep my bearings, I started crying. Bawling. Yelling into my coat to stifle the noise. I felt that maybe if I yelled loud enough, the burning and aching in my chest might disappear. How could I have forgotten that? That was one of the most memorable expriences I ever had, and I just up and forgot about it, like it never even happened. Now, it was like it just happened, right in front of me at this very second. If I didn't have important business to tend to, life threatening business, I would have just curled up on the ground right there and cried.

I gathered myself, wiping off my face, and taking a few deep breaths. With that, I found a new anger burning inside of me. A flame had ignited and I felt like something in my chest was soon to explode. I started trotting forward at a fast past, in the direction I felt the shack was in. I just knew. The more I walked, the more I recgonized the surroundings. This is the forest Kenny and I were running through in one of my dreams. I must have spent a lot of time in these woods, as everywhere I looked had an eerie familiarity.

Eventually, I came across a circle of snow-covered stumps around a mound. I was overcome by a feeling of intense sadness as I recalled more parts of that night. The anger was still smoldering in my chest. I looked about thirty feet away to see that old, repulsive, rotting shack. Despite the years, that shed still looked the same. It had one door where there was supposed to be double doors, and a rusted, bent up tin roof. It was about ten by twenty feet, creating a rectangular shape. I saw three or four pairs of footprints leading to it, and I realized that this was going to be bad. That said, I couldn't let Kenny be in there with them alone.

I walked toward it with both dread and a horrible, burning anger. When I got two or three feet away, I could see inside. The floor had rotted away until there was nothing but dirt left, and the walls had vines that were struggling to live in the harsh climate. I could see a variety of rusted, broken tools hanging from the ceiling in mangled, disorganized chaos. I started to get the feeling I should leave.

I stood there for long minute after long minute, thinking through scenarios and game plans. The longer I stood there, the more I started to hear hard whispers and muffled laughs. I decided to take a few minutes to think things over before I entered, so I turned to take a seat on one of the stumps. To my surprise, I trurnedto meet eyes with Stan, holding a wide, thick board. I hadn't even heard his foot steps, I was so tangled up in my own head.

"Oh, uh. H-hey Stan." My voice sounded so small and weak, I almost didn't recognize it.

"Hey, I saw you heading this way, and it looked like you were upset, what's the deal?" He asked, quirking an eyebrow and giving a concerned look.

"Oh, I was just heading out for some air.." I said, regaining my composure.

To tell you the truth, I was really glad to see Stan. I know I had some suspicions about him in the past, but I didn't have anything to really go on. At this point, I was debating on whether I should tell him the situation, or just try to get him out of here as quickly as possible so I could carry on doing what I needed to do. He still hadn't earned my trust entirely, so I figured I would just put him at ease and send him on his way. Killing a little time and being unsure of what to say, I looked around. As I was turning back, I heard a gust and the whistling of something flying toward me. I met eyes with a glaring Stan just before the board met my face with a sickening _crack._


	16. We Live Under the Bullet

I woke up, and my entire body had a pulse. I felt like I was on fire, I could feel sweat running down my face, but it brought a chill that I couldn't quite explain. I had my eyes shut tight, and when I released the muscles keeping them shut, they opened slightly. Everything was a blur, but I could see a mixture of browns and grays that told me exactly where I was. I turned my head to the right and my cheek met a rotted, wooden floor. I could see the outline of a door, leading to nothing back black. The room was being lit by something, but I couldn't tell what it was. It felt like a was dreaming, like none of this was actually real.

I squinted my eyes and blinked a few times, and some of my vision returned. I lifted my head slightly and held it up, despite the tearing pain in my neck. I was laying with my right side toward the door of the old shed, and to my feet, there was an old, metal flashlight hanging from a rusted metal tool that was hanging from the ceiling. The tool was sharp and resembled a pick, but almost appeared to be a surgical tool of some sort. The muscles in my neck gave out and my head hit the floor with a dull, dirt-like thud.

Hanging from the ceiling was an arrangement of demented, rusted tools that may have once been organized, but were now a mangled mass of scrap that was almost impossible to distiguish one tool from another. I could see the metal roof of the shack, which was just as rusted as the tools. The tools were hanging by chains and cords that were nearly eaten away by age, and there were some broken cords, and a couple of tools littering the floor that had fallen.

I shook my head a couple of times, and recalled what happened before I went out. At this point, I was confused and a little mad, but more than anything, I was scared. I was in pain, I got hit in the face with a plank of wood, I was in a shed in the middle of the woods, and I was surrounded by enemies and had no idea where they were or what they had planned. Not to mention, I was afraid they had done something awful to Kenny. I had already seen an example of that before, and it wasn't pretty.

I could hear crackling, but nothing more. I sat up and nearly threw up, the entire room was spinning at a speed I didn't know was possible. I had to get up and catch my bearings, but as things were, I couldn't even tell whether minutes or hurs were passing as the room spun by. How long had I even been knocked out? I tried to stretch into a crouching position, but fell forward on my hands and knees after losing my balance. I felt a sense of dread as I stared down at the dirt. This was too familiar. I looked up to see a broken counter, and beside it was a mound that I could recognize was a pile of rotted, mushy cardboard boxes that had been knocked over.. By me. Those are the boxes I used to conceal myself years ago. They used to be in moderate condition, but they were now reduced to a heap of squishy, shapeless grub.

I felt sick to my stomach, so I was taking deep, long breaths. I bent upward slowly, feeling the beating in my head grow stronger. I leaned on a beam that held up the middle of the shack, which in retrospect probably wasn't safe, and closed my eyes. I could hear familiar crackling and the whistling of wind against the old, wooden walls. After the spinning subsided, I made my way over to the doorway, slowly. At a closer look, it wasn't just dark out, but there was a light coming from a fire, and the crackling was louder. I felt my heart start beating faster as I peeked out.

There were six stumps, occupied by Clyde, Token, Tweek, Cartman, Kenny and Stan, and there were three empty stumps. Kenny was sitting on the ground in front of the stump with his knees up to his chest and hands furrowed in his hair, clenching his head. His face was ubstructed by the shadow of the fire, but he looked tense. Clyde had his back to me, Kenny was in front of him on the other side of the fire, Stan was to Kenny's left and the others were taking up the other stumps, Token taking up two, with a backpack. The two empty stumps were the ones next to Clyde. They weren't talking at all, just sitting there, as if they were waiting for me.

"Come join the party, Craig, we're having a great time." Clyde said, still facing the fire.

The abruptness of his voice in the calm environment startled me, and I pulled my face back into the shed. I regretted the weakness of my action as soon as I did it, but I had to get a game plan together before I went out there. After briefly acessing the situation, I realized I only had two choices. Stay in the shed, or go out there and wing it. Facing the fact that I had no control over the situation was much easier than I thought it would be. I grimaced to myself a bit before I turned back toward the door and stepped out into the slightly colder environment. Everyone was silent as I took my seat next to Clyde on a stump and stared into the fire, waiting for him to speak.

There was a long silence as everyone sat there, waiting for what Clyde had planned. I looked up at Stan, who just stared into the fire with a blank expression. Token and Cartman were exchanging smirks and Tweek was just shaking with anticipation. I felt like my tension was nearly tangible, as if everyone could feel it. Tweek and I were nearly on the same level, how things were headed. Kenny hadn't looked up at me, but at a closer glance, I could see that his clothes were tattered and torn in some places. They had roughed him up a bit. Just the thought of them putting their hands on him ticked me off.

"You know, I really missed this." Clyde said with a chuckle, "Just like old times."

"What do you want, Clyde?" I asked impatiently, letting out a hard sigh.

I hadn't meant for the words to come out, but they did, and I meant them. I was ready to get whatever this was going, and end it. However, to my dismay, I now noticed something that sent a shock all over my body. I couldn't see most of Clyde's face, but what I could see was a smirk beneath his dark brown bangs in the wind. Clyde was sitting slightly hunched with his hands between his legs, and I originall assumed it was to shield them from the cold, but now I knew otherwise. Clyde was holding a gun in his hands.

"You know, we were really good friend's once, but in my entire life, I can't say I ever really had a best friend." Clyde said putting a hand behind his head, "I just never really could relate to anyone, I guess."

Was he trying to make me feel bad for him or something? I was beginning to feel like this was kind of twisted. Clyde was clearly very disturbed, and knowing that our lives rested on what he decided to do with the piece in his hands was no comfort to me. I wanted to know what the meaning of all of this was, but knowing the danger, I was afraid to ask too many questions.

"I know, Craig." He said, looking at me and tilting his head in a seemingly flirty way, "I'm sick."

Just then, I realized just how messed up this whole thing is.

"You need to tell me what this is about." I said, gesturing to Kenny and to the rest of the group.

He paused and shook his head with a smile, "Well, as I see it, there's two ways I can make you keep your mouth shut. I just haven't decided exactly how I'm going to achieve either of them efficiently."

He was going about this as if it were some kind of business deal. I was still confused, and I couldn't see him getting out of this in any way. He and I both knew that as soon as he let us all go home, I was going to the police, and there was no escaping from that. He was dragging this on longer than I had the patience for. I felt like my heart was about to give out. The most disgusting part of all of this was that I had never really noticed just how attractive Clyde was. He was eerily handsome, with his eyes hidden by his hair and a wide, maniacal smile lie a plague to his mouth. He looked absolutely and entirely out of his mind. Part of me wondered just how much it took to seem normal on a daily basis.

"So Craig. How did you do on the test?" Clyde asked me, leaning his head on his hand and letting the gun in his hand dangle from his index finger.

I couldn't get over just how casual he was trying to make this seem, it was really starting to bother me. Not in an angry way, but in an uncomfortable way. If Clyde could act this normal while holding two people hostage, just how much could he be capable of? No one else had said a word, so it was still creepily silent aside from the conversation Clyde and I were having, if you can even call it a conversation.

"That's a pity, it's really rude not to answer when someone asks you a question." Clyde said quietly, the smile fading from his face.

At that, he got up from the stump and walked over to Kenny, gun in hand. I stood up, earning eyes from everyone at the fire. Clyde knelt down to Kenny and looked at him in calculation, then lifted his chin with a hand. Kenny's face had a large bruise on the left side by his temple down to his middle cheek. His eyes were wide and blank, and as soon as Clyde touched him, he tensed up and I could hear his staggered breathing. Clyde then grabbed him hard by the hair on top of his head, and stood, lifting Kenny with him.

"Put him down, you sick fuck." The protest exploded out of me, without having given it a second thought.

Clyde chuckled, "Oh, I'm the sick fuck. You really must have lost that pretty little memory of yours." His smile quickly faded again and he tilted his head in a way that was nearly not human, "You really have it twisted, didn't Kenny tell you anything?"

I looked at him, waiting for him to elaborate, but nothing came. The more he went on about Kenny keeping a secret, the more I realized it was the truth by the look on Kenny's face.

"Your sister was a real treat, Craig." Clyde said, tauntingly.

The cold air in my lungs lunged out of me like someone had punched me in the stomach. Sparkles and circles of light began to flutter in my vision as the memories flooded into my brain like water filling a balloon. It felt like my head was swelling.

_"Craig, give them back!" I heard a young girl's voice, crying and pleading._

_ I took her hair ties and held them over my head as she hopped and jumped, trying to reach them, but I was nearly a foot taller than her. I could see tears in her baby blue eyes as I angily waved them over my head. I gave her a light shove and made my way out of her room, past the pink carpet and down the hall. I could hear her cry as she ran after me, her foot steps following me down the hallway. I looked back to see her tear-filled face surrounded by her long, flowing strawberry-blonde hair, flying everywhere as she ran. _

_ I ran into my room and shut my door, locking it. From under my bed, I pulled out a shoe box and opened it, not removing any of the items inside. I dropped the tiny, peach-colored hair ties into the box, shut it, taped it and walked over to my closet. I opened the door, slid my clothes to either side of my closet so I could see the back. I had never explored behind the wall in my closet before, but I needed somewhere to hide the box, so I pulled at one of the loose boards in the back of my closet. I smiled to myself when the plywood came loose, revealing a small, dark room. I slid the box into the hole and to the side, then I pulled back from the dust and left them there. _

I started screaming. Shouting. Yelling. I gripped both sides of my head as I continued to yell, my memories of Mary pouring into my head like a liquid filling a glass. I walked over to the shed in my blind flow of emotion, and I started punching. I hit the wood two times, three times, six times, ten times, until my hands were pulsing and bloody. Tiring myself out, I leaned my head on the side of the shed and started sobbing. This time, it wasn't physical pain I was feeling. It was emotional, and it was the most real feeling I've had for as long as I could remember. Until now, I felt like I was a senseless shell masquerading as a person, faking the way I felt to appear more human to everyone else. Right now, at this very second, I felt human, I felt alive. I felt hurt, I felt betrayed, and more than anything, I felt a sense of rage that I had never felt before. I turned my head to Clyde, and as soon as I saw his face, a part of me lost control. I lunged toward Clyde with force, knocking us both to the ground, and started swinging.

I continued to swing until I heard him cock the gun, and I was staring down the barrel. With a line of blood running from his mouth, he smiled widely at me and started laughing. His laugh was sobering, and I came back to the reality of the situation. I sat on top of him while he laughed, too afraid to move. He didn't move the gun from my face.

"Y-You know," He said between laughs, "I kind of like it when you fight back."

He lifted the gun a bit higher until it touched the center of my forehead. The frozen metal was painful as it touched my bare skin.

"Get off." He said seriously, "And sit the fuck down."

I lifted my hands at the sides of my head and slowly crept into a standing position. He wiped the line of blood from his face as I took my seat, and turned his gun on Kenny. It amazed me just how quickly his emotions changed. It was like playing Russian Roulette with feelings, you put every emotion in the chambers, gave it a spin and handed him the gun.

"Why my sister?" I asked him, looking down at the fire and gritting my teeth, hard. "What did she ever do to you?"

He gave me a confused look, "Why are you asking me?" He said slowly, "Everyone here had a piece of her. Everyone but you."

I looked at Kenny, feeling the blood drain from my face.

"That's right, Craig. Even this little runt got a slice of that pussy."

I felt a pang of shock roll over my body and started shaking my head uncontrollably. That couldn't be true. Kenny is gay. Kenny and I were an item when that happened to her.

"That's not true." I said, looking at Kenny and feeling the tears form in my eyes, "Is it?"

He didn't answer, but he looked away from me, away from the fire and toward the trees. His silence was painful, and it was enough to tell me that it had to be true, but it wasn't enough for Clyde. Clyde shoved the barrel of the gun against the back of Kenny's head, hard.

"Tell him, you little bitch. Tell him how you fucked her." Clyde gave a raspy, hard whisper into Kenny's ear, then he yelled, startling Kenny, "Tell him!"

Kenny flinched and turned toward me, and I waited for some sort of consolation, any explanation, anything to tell me that this wasn't how it sounded. The silence was a jab in my chest, and my mouth tried to utter out any words, but nothing came out. Instead, was just a jumble of beginings of words, until my mouth shut. One more thrust of the gun into the back of his head, and it was out.

"I- I fucked her." He said, his voice cracking after every word.

"Say it again, faggot." Clyde said angrily, gabbing Kenny hard by the arm and pushing the gun into his skull.

"I fucked her!" Kenny said, closing his eyes tightly and allowing tears to escape.

Clyde threw him onto the ground, and turned toward me. At this point, I wasn't even thinking. I didn't want to think. I didn't know what was true and what was forced, but what I knew was that everything made sense. It made sense that Kenny would keep it a secret, and it made sense that he was so worried about me remembering, but what didn't make sense was that I knew Kenny loved me. I knew he cared about me, and I didn't understand why he would do something to hurt me that bad. The more I thought about him putting his hands on my sister, touching her, _having sex with her_, the less I cared about his reasons, the less I gave a damn about why he did it. I hadn't realized it, but I had my knees up to my chest and I was rocking back and fourth like a perpetual four-year-old, tears rolling down my face.

"I'm sorry.." I heard Kenny say with a broken voice, "I-"

I heard a smack and looked over to see Kenny on his knees, Clyde had gun-checked him. I just sat there, waiting for whatever I had coming to me. At this point, I lost a lot of the hope that was getting me through this whole thing. I came here to help someone I trusted, someone I _loved_, someone who betrayed me, raped and killed my little sister. Five years had passed since then, but it all came rushing back like it just happened before my very eyes. I was mortified. Destroyed.

"Now." I heard Clyde say in a serious voice, "I know you're going straight to the police after this."

I had spent the last fifteen to twenty minutes with an entirely blank mind, despite the situation. To be completely honest, I hadn't even thought about police, or ramifications for their crime, or any kind of revenge. I'd just been sitting here trying to figure out where I went wrong in all of this, why I was lied to, how easily I was fooled.

"You see, I can prevent that from happening two ways." He continued, walking over and kneeling down to me, "I could just kill you right here, that's the first way. Or.."

He looked over at everyone else, including Kenny, who was clutching his head and sobbing.

"You can kill Kenny." He finished, caressing my cheek, "If you kill Kenny, going to the police will get us all in trouble. That includes you."

I realized now exactly what this was about, all of it. This whole dramatic thing was a desperate attempt as saving his ass. All of them were in on it, and Kenny was their way out. Part of me wanted to willingly kill him, for betraying me so entirely. He made me feel so much love, all I ever wanted to do was making him happy. I had my eyes so set on winning the prize that I didn't realize how cracked and busted it was. Broken beyond repair. I hadn't had a lot of trust when I moved here, and as I stand here looking at him, I didn't have an ounce of trust left. It was like a stream that had long dried in the barren heat; no matter how the rain pours, it will never quite run the same.

"It's your choice, Craig. It's you.. Or the guy who raped your sister." He said, "Stan's got a piece, so don't do anything you'll regret."

He handed me the pistol and backed away from me. I looked toward Stan to see him reach in his coat and pull out a nearly identical gun to the one I was holding. My mind was still racing from all the information being crammed into it, and I almost couldn't comprehend the fact that I was about to die.

Without saying a word, I walked over to the kneeling Kenny and lifted the pistol to his head. Even though he was facing away from me, he still knew what was coming, and he started sobbing. His chin was nearly to his chest, his head was down so far, and I could see him trembling. No matter how he shook, I just didn't have any sympthy left for him.

My finger on the trigger, it felt like a brick hit me in the back of the head.

_There was tools hanging from the ceiling, rusted and overgrown with some kind of vine-like plant. There was almost no floor, just creeping shrub and dirt. I looked for somewhere, anywhere to hide. I pulled myself under a low, wooden counter attached to the wall and knocked some old boxes over to conceal myself. I looked through a small hole between the mushy cardboardm mess I had used for cover, but I could only see the dirt flooring. A few minutes later there was brief talking outside._

_I had run away from them all, leaving Mary with Clyde out by the fire. Part of me wanted to run back, but I knew I was out-numbered._

_ " Where did he run off to? .." I heard Cartman breathing heavily._

_ "I don't know, but he better keep his mouth shut." Token muttered._

_ I could see their feet from where I was sitting, but nothing else. After a few minutes, I could hear fighting outside. I heard Mary crying, and I could hear the sound of coats rustling against each other in a struggle. I saw Mary's shoes enter, along with Clyde, and Kenny followed shortly after. He appeared to be hesitating, as if he didn't know what to do._

_ "Don't fight it, baby, you know you want to feel this big dick." I heard Clyde say, sparking anger inside of me._

_ I knew that if I came out now, we wouldn't have a chance. I waited for an opening, I listened to her scream and plead the whole time, trying to figure out what to do.. But nothing came. I just sat there, waiting for them to finish, hoping they would leave her there and we could run away and tell mom and dad afterward. _

_ "Come on, McCormick, don't you want some?" I heard Cartman say._

_ ".. No, I- I don't.." I heard him mutter, he almost sounded sick to his stomach, like he was about to throw up._

_ "What are you, a fag?" I heard Clyde ask, harshly, "We've all seen you and your faggot-ass friend around town. You think that shit is cute? You want attention? Well now you've got it."_

_ I heard the familiar cock of a gun, and a shiver made it's way down my spine._

_ "Fuck her." I heard, then silence._

_ There was a long pause, as I stared at the black ti-tops, barely in my view. It was almost a painful silence. I had hoped so much that he would turn around and walk out, yell, run for help, but it never happened. He just stood there. We were just twelve-year-old kids._

_ "What, you need my help or something? I can get you started." Clyde spat, doing something unimaginable to Mary._

_ I heard her yelp a bit and start crying._

_ "Do it now, you stupid faggot!" I heard Clyde scream at Kenny, and give him a hard shove toward Mary._

I started coughing, hard. I was going to be sick.

At that, I turned toward the darkness of the forest and wretched behind one of the stumps. I heard a couple of questioning murmurs as I coughed out bile onto the ground.

"The fuck is wrong with this guy?" I heard Cartman ask.

"Shut up." Clyde said, sounding annoyed, "Do it now, Tucker, or Stan will blow your brains out."

I took a second to catch my breath and walked back over to Kenny, raising the gun to his head once again.

I remembered now that it had only been by gun that he did what he did. He was forced, it was almost like the rape was mutual. Clyde had taken advantage of both of them. I oculdn't take Kenny's life knowing that his intention was never to hurt Mary. He didn't want to. He and I both had the same goal when she was murdered, and that was to wait until the rape ended, hoping Clyde would spare her. But he didn't. Clyde had to mercy. He had no compassion. He blew her head off, and tried to beat me and leave me in the snow to freeze to death.

I quickly turned my aim from Kenny to Clyde, hoping it would disperse the situation, but unfortunately, it only made things more complicated.

"Stan." Clyde ordered, earning a sigh from behind me.

I heard Stan stand and cock his gun, but I didn't back down. I kept my aim at Clyde, and tried to push any doubt from my mind as I put pressure on the trigger. The gun went off, and my ears were ringing. I had my eyes shut so tightly without realizing it, that I wasn't even sure what I hit. When I opened them, I didn't even know what I was looking at.


	17. My Resolution

I felt a strike of shock hit me as soon as I could understand what I saw.

Clyde stood in front of me, his mouth agape, and his hand on the right side of his neck. I could see a clear river of blood flowing from under his hand. There was blood spatter from his neck to the right side of his face, and his eyes were wide and scared. It was only a matter of seconds before his look of horror turned to rage. I had missed and must have just grazed him. His eyes narrowed at me, and I knew that what came next wasn't going to be good. My ears were still ringing from the gun shot, but I could make out exactly what he was saying.

"Shoot him, Stan." He said, looking behind me and gesturing to me with his free hand.

I wasn't sure what my next move should be. I knew I had a gun aimed at me, and the guy holding it was a traitor and apparently had his own agenda. I hadn't thought much about Stan's situation, but I really didn't get what exactly his goal was in this whole, messed up thing. For whatever reason, he seemed to be closer to Clyde than any of the other goons sitting around this fire, but something about that was very off. The entire time I've been here, they hadn't said as much as two words to each other.. So I thought. I knew he followed along and did what the other disgusting trash did to Mary, but none of them were pointing a gun at me. What made his situation so dire that he would follow in Clyde's footsteps?

I turned around to face Stan, and I could also see Kenny, who looked a little more relaxed, but was still hugging his legs to his chest with his face down. I locked eyes with Stan and sighed, trying to think of what to say to him. I had so many questions I wanted to ask him, but I knew it would all be in vain. I could almost feel the impatience radiating from Clyde behind me, I didn't realize just how tangible hatred could be. It felt like a monster lurking behind me, reaching toward me, creeping up my back and wrapping around my neck in detestation.

"Come on, Stan." Clyde said, starting to sound more threatening, "I can still fuck you."

I gave Stan a questioning look, but then it hit me. He was being obedient, because Clyde had more against him than the others. Stan had gotten himself wrapped up in more than he had the means to get himself out of. He had snowballed, trying to keep himself from reaping any repercussions. He had made a mistake when he was young, by helping destroy my sister, and ever since then, he had been bowing, surrendering to all of Clyde's commands. Now, he had done too much, as the skeletons in his closet were impossible to hide.

"You cut my mom's break-line." I said flatly.

He didn't reply to me, he just raised the gun an inch or two higher, to meet my eyes. I was staring down the barrel, and it was so close to my face that I couldn't even see Stan's anymore. All I could see was that shiny, metal destiny, staring me in the eyes. I felt like there could be a way out of this, that maybe there was something I could say to make him change his mind. I knew that he was driven by one thing, all of them were, and that was fear.

"It just keeps adding up, doesn't it?" I asked him, looking at my feet, then at Kenny.

Kenny was looking at me with his deep blue eyes, tears still on his face. I looked back to Stan, and the gun had lowered an inch or so. I could see the perplexed look on his face, and I knew he must have convinced himself that this was the only way, and that everything would be fine if he just kept hiding everything. Deep down, he knew that he would never get off with the things he's done, but he'd spent so much time denying it that he got caught up, just like the rest of us. I had never really understood the effect of peer pressure, but I think I'm staring to get an inside look on the definition.

"Come on, asshole. I'm fucking bleeding." Clyde said angrily, earning an irritated twinge from Stan.

We stood there for what seemed like hours, no one moved. I could see the gears turning in Stan's head as he mulled things over. I could relate to his situation entirely. We've both been looking for the easy way out, and by the look on his face, he's reached the same conclusion that I did. There is no easy way. This wasn't like one of the movies, where the villain goes to jail and all the innocent parties carried on happily. Good people were down the road to punishment, and bad people were going to get off Scott free. The situation was wrong. Kids turned into rapists and murderers and they got away with it for a long time, but they always knew there was going to be a moment of reckoning, and this was it. Stan's eyes said he was ready to turn himself in, but the gun was still pointed at my face.

"Stan, I'll fucking ruin you if you don't kill this faggot." Clyde hissed, breaking my thoughts.

I still had the gun in my hand. I had been sweating earlier, but now as my hands cooled down, the metal was starting to stick to my moist skin. I shuffled it around a bit, and then a thought popped into my head that might change the situation. It was a shot in the dark, but I decided to go with my instict.

I shuffled around and held out my gun to Stan, by the barrel. He gave me a confused look and didn't move for a minute or two. The look on his face was as serious as death, I'd swear it could have been chiseled out of stone if I didn't know any better. After he assessed the situation, his face relaxed and his eyes softened. He hesitated a bit and took the gun from my hand. At this point, Stan knew that my fate rested on his shoulders. I had hoped that by trusting him with my destiny, that perhaps he would trust me with his. The gleam in his eyes gave a hint that we understood each other, if only a little.

"Just give me the gun, you incompetent retard." Clyde said, holding out a hand.

With that, Stan adjusted his aim and I stepped to the side, almost simultaneously.

Any color the harsh cold had left on Clyde's face had now disappeared. He looked like he was in a mix of rage and confusion as his mouth opened slightly and closed again. This was the first time I had ever seen him rendered speechless. It had been a long night, and he had maintained his composure very well throughout the trials we had faced, even after being shot. Now, though, he stood there like a child, waiting for his punishment. I was hoping Stan was just going to scare him off, so he could be punished later. However, by the seriousness of his face, I could tell that he had more on his mind than a bluff.

"I've been a bad person, and I've done a lot of things I regret." Stan whispered, not taking his eyes off of Clyde, "But I'm going to do the right thing this time."

"Dude, what are you doing?" Token asked slowly, standing.

Stan ignored him, lifted the gun to his eye, aimed at Clyde, and pulled the trigger.

_There was a loud buffer from the sound of the gun to the splash of water. _

_ There was a dull overcast, the sky was gray with the promise of snow in the dead of winter. I looked down from the sky. I was sitting on an old bridge, overlooking a stream. There was snow on the ground, but I felt warm. I swept my hand over the bridge at my side, and felt another rock hit the tip of my finger. I gripped it and embraced the smooth, cold surface, and held it in my hand for a few seconds. I crossed my arms over the beam of the bridge, kicking my feet back and fourth as they dangled over the edge. I dropped the rock over the edge, expecting the calm splash, but to my surprise, I heard a thud and a yelp._

_ "Ouch.. Who did that?" I heard a young voice, much like my own. _

_ I leaned over the edge of the bridge a bit and saw a boy my age, standing on one of the larger rocks in the stream. He had shaggy, auburn hair and glasses, and a long, red coat. His hand was on his head, and his face was pink from the cold. After he noticed me, he stared up at me, and I stared down at him for a few seconds. We were both young, and he appeared to be seven or eight, just like me. _

_ "H-hey, what are you doing up there?" He asked me, his eyes wide and innocent_

_ "Throwin' rocks." I said simply, my voice ten years younger._

_ "Why?" He asked, looking around._

_ I shrugged, "I dunno, you wanna try?" I asked, holding up a rock._

_ He nodded and made his way out of the stream and up the hill next to the bridge. He hesitated before taking a seat next to me. I held out the rock to him and smiled, trying to put him at ease._

_ "I'm Craig." I said as he took the rock from my hand._

_ He let the rock go and it hit the water with a splash, "I'm Clyde."_

_ Before he had stopped talking, his voice faded out into loud static and everything disappeared. My eyes were shut, because I never had the courage to open them when I was afraid. I guess it was wishful thinking, that maybe if I couldn't see it, it was never real. I was in a strange place for the first time. I felt the unfamiliar carpet under my arm as I hugged the strange pillow that smelled like a closet. Clean, but not fresh. I can still feel the ache in my chest when I heard the yelling. I can still feel the creep of sensation over my face when I heard the hit. I still felt the broken feeling in my chest when I heard him crying and pleading. _

_ "I thought I told you clean the dishes, you little prick." I heard a man's raspy, seemingly druken voice. _

_ "D-dad, I'm sor-ry." I heard Clyde sob._

_ I'd never seen someone punished before, and I never knew parents could talk to kids that way. My parents would have never known that one sleepover could change my outlook on life so entirely. I was afraid, and confused, but when he came back in the room, I pretended I was asleep. I pretended I had never heard a thing, and hoped that if I acted like I didn't hear it, that maybe I wouldn't have to talk about it. It was only after laying there in the silence, that I heard his quiet whimpers, that is discovered how little I had a tolerance for sadness._

_ A little afraid of his response, I sat up and looked toward his bed. He was facing the wall, but I could see the trembling of his tiny frame. I looked toward the door as the hall light was turned off, and I stood up and walked to his bed. He looked up at me, noticing my shadow, and wiped his face with his arm, embarrassed. Not taking note of it, I pulled back his blanket and slid under the covers with him. At first, he was stiff and unsure, but he calmed down a bit after a minute or two, and faced me, despite his uncertainty. I'd never been more comfortable than I was then, my arms around his back and my hands combing through his hair._

A tear escaped my eye as I watched the blood spatter onto the shed behind him.

You know, the end is bittersweet sometimes. You tend to forget just how special someone is or was until they're gone, and in that last second of Clyde's life, I realized that there would always be a special place in my heart for him. We were friends once, and I hadn't remembered what it was like until it was all over. Somewhere down the road, something with him went wrong, and now five kids are murderers. That's really all we were, just kids. I realized then, that our goal at the end of the day is just to make it home safely. We're all just kids trying to find our way home when the street lights turn on.

After we all took a few minutes to comprehend the situation, Stan and I looked at each other, then Kenny exchanged a look with me. Cartman was staring at Clyde, unable to take his eyes off of him. Everyone had a moment of apprehension as Clyde lie there on his back, and a hole through the center of his forehead. At the moment, all of us were on the same page. We were all experiencing an overwhelming sense of dread, and for that time, we were all knowingly on the same level.

"Dude, you fucking killed him, holy shit." Token exclaimed, standing with a hand on his head, "What the hell?"

Stan looked at him and then back at me.

"I-I'm getting the fuck out of here dude, this shit is bad." Tweek said, twitching and running off immediately after saying it.

Token grabbed Cartman by the hoodie and tugged on him to get his attention. After Cartman snapped back to reality, they both ran off after Tweek. The three of us, Stan, Kenny and I just stayed there with Clyde, not sure what to do. Honestly, no one really thinks about the silence after the kill. The tribulation of the harsh actuality to come. At the same time, there was a calming effect to the quietness. We were all scared, but we all knew that this was the last moment of peace we would have for a long time. As sick it it might sound, I felt almost at ease in one way, and scared to death in another.

I sat down next to Kenny, leaning on him and putting an arm behind his back. He'd been through a lot, and I was hoping he felt the same feeling that things were going to be okay now. I looked up to Stan, who was still standing there, frozen with the gun still in his hand. He was lost in a spiral of thoughts, I could tell. About his future, the punishments, how his life would change. I wanted him to take a minute just to relax with us, despite the things he's done lately. He looked down at me and I waved him over, hoping he would take this chance to stop thinking and just stare into the fire. He dropped the guns, took one last look at Clyde, and sat next to me on the ground. The sky began to lighten as we stared into the fire.


	18. Death Brings No Surrender

Walking up to my room after that night was different. It felt like I was entering a completely different world, and in a way, I was. I was sitting by the fire with Stan and Kenny at roughly five in the morning, arrived at the police station around nine in the morning, and now it was nine at night. I sat there, explaining what I knew and waiting for twelve hours. Mainly, it was just waiting. I was by myself until the last hour, and they wouldn't tell me anything about Stan or Kenny, but I did see Kenny's mom there when I was leaving. I was relieved to see that he wouldn't be alone right now, but I was more relieved that I would be able to ask someone about him.

I turned the knob on my door, and gave it a tap. It glided open and I was looking at my room. The first thing I noticed was Kenny's shirt on the floor. It's weird knowing the absence of someone, but still seeing their things casually hanging about. It's strange knowing that when he left this morning, he thought he would be coming home. I scuffled in the doorway for a minute or so, leaning on the door frame. Despite being up for nearly thirty-six hours, I still didn't feel tired. To be honest, it didn't even feel like I was really awake. Everything from the night before felt like a dream I had. Really, everything that's happened in the past month has felt incredibly unreal.

After we sat there for a couple of hours, we all went into the police department and told them the situation. We told them about Mary, and we told them about Clyde. Stan confessed to shooting Clyde, and cutting my mom's break line at his request. They didn't really take us seriously until one of the officers came back from the "scene". We told them about Cartman, Token and Tweek, but from what I could gather, they were only able to contact Tweek's mother. They waited on my mom or dad for a long time, and I wanted to wait, but eventually I got tired and just started talking. I don't remember everything I said, but I remember the first thing I said.

"We were all friends."

It surprised me that it was the first thing out of my mouth. Out of all the hours I spent sitting there, thinking about what to say, that's the first thing on my mind. I told them about my memory loss, about my mom in the hospital, about Clyde's harassment, about Mary, I told them everything. I didn't hold any regard to the effect of the information, who it would hurt or who it would help, I just needed to tell someone. Anyone. After three or four hours, they walked in and explained that Stan had disclosed the location of her body, but they still hadn't told me where it was. All they said was that they would contact my family when they knew for sure.

My dad ended up coming in around four in the afternoon, but he didn't get in the room with me until five. When he finally did get in the room, he told me my mom was awake and talking, which was a relief. The hospital wasn't going to release her for a week or two, but she was expected to make a full recovery. At the mention of Mary, my father seemed very hesitant, reluctant to say anything to or in front of me. However, after assuring him that I remembered everything, he told the officer everything he could that would help identify her. That she was ten, had reddish-blonde hair, had recently lost her front tooth and frequently wore skirts and dresses. The entire time he was speaking, he avoided eye contact with me. He almost didn't sound like my father at all.

I still wasn't clear about why they hid her from me. If I were in their situation, I would have been doing everything in my power to find Mary, not do eveything I could to forget her. Right now, my father was sitting down there at the police department, waiting to hear any news. I was standing here in my doorway, trying to figure out how to make my house feel like home. I shook my head and walked over to my bed. I sat down and looked around again, but I already knew what I had to do. The hole in my closet seemed darker than before, every time I looked at it, I felt a spike of anxiety hit me. It was like an open casket.

I stared at it for a minute or two, but I made my way to the opening and ran my hands down the broken boards. I sighed and reached in, not very far, still sliding my hand along the other side of the wall. I slid my hand warily, feeling dust roll into small balls beneath my finger tips. Just as I began to doubt my memory, my index finger hit something. The sudden contact made me inhale sharply. I closed my eyes and slid my hand over the top of the box, gritting my teeth in anticipation. I was treating it more like a time bomb than a time capsule, as if any sudden movements would cause some kind of explosion. I wrapped my hand around it and lifted it, sliding it out of the closet.

It was a tan shoe box with a green stripe that read "Danila", which was a popular shoe company in South Park a few years back. I just stood there and looked at it, for the longest time. I was trying to remember what I had left inside of it, but I was also stalling. I could feel the dread creeping up my throat as I read it in my head over and over again. I turned to my bed, and heard a thud that nearly scared me out of my skin. The box had broken from wear and tear, and on the floor lie the remains of the bottom, among other things. I crouched down to pick them up, when I was stopped abruptly by the sight of those _tiny peach hair ties._

I felt a groan of unease ascend in my throat as I reached down and picked them up. After all the years, they still looked brand new. As I held my hand out, palm up, and stared at them, I could almost feel them burning a hole in my hand. They had a tiny metal bar connecting them into a circle, but aside from that, they were entirely peach. I could remember the day I gave them to her as a gift. Her ninth birthday. Every child has an item they won't part with, and for Mary, it was the hair ties. I knew, even as a kid, that it was a gesture of her admiration for me. She followed me around constantly, I found her looking at the things in my room frequently, and often I was upset about her being in my territory. If I knew then what I know now, I would never have been angry with her for loving me so much.

When Mary was born, I was too young to really understand what was going on. Two is far too young to comprehend that kind of thing. All I really knew while I was growing up, was that Mary was the reason I got less. Less toys, less attention, and I often resented her for it when I knew it wasn't her fault. Now, looking back on how I took her for granted, I realize that I never really knew I loved her. She was around all the time, and I always thought she would just be an unwilling part of my day for the rest of my life. Something I didn't sign up for, a little, annoying, invasive person that I couldn't get rid of. But she was a person. She was annoying, she was invasive, but she was a _person_. She loved violets, and any time our father said they were weeds, she would argue. She loved to play board games, even though I almost always told her I didn't want to play. Her favorite color was purple, she loved fruits, her favorite carnival ride was the Merry-Go-Round, because it had her name in it. She was a human being, she had preferences, and she preferred me to anyone else. Me of all people, even when I treated her rather badly.

I looked past my hand at the other items that had fallen from the box, and saw a dog collar that I immediately recognized. I set the hair ties on my bed and picked up the red leather collar. On a name tag in the front it read "Lucy", along with my mom's old number and the address to this house. Lucy was a Christmas gift to Mary one year, and Mary knew what to name her as soon as she saw her. Knowing things as they are now, I questioned myself on if Lucy's death could have foreshadowed the death of Mary. As if I should have known, as if maybe I could have prevented it if I had just looked at the signs more closely, but in my heart, I knew better. We all look back on things we regret and try to think of ways we could have prevented it, as if we are punishing ourselves with the torturous idea of how things could have turned out differently. The sobering fact of the matter is that no matter how much you wish you can get a second chance, you never truly do. Even in every day situations that you're forgiven, things will never be the same as they were before you made the mistake, because mistakes are never forgotten. When you shatter a plate, you can glue it back together, but you still see the crack and remember the time you dropped it, if even for just a moment.

I set Lucy's collar down next to Mary's hair ties and turned back to the item's I had dropped. Remaining was a notebook, some old pens, an adjusting piece to my old telescope and a little piece of paper with a badly drawn circle and some lines on it. I was sure the notebook was for one of my old school subjects, as "math" had been scrawled on the front of it in marker, but when I opened it, I recognized it as an old journal I had kept as a kid. Deciding to make myself more comfortable before I read it, I put the rest of the odds-and-ends items on my desk, kicked my shoes off and sat on my bed next to Lucy's collar and Mary's hair ties. I vaguely remembered keeping this journal, but forgot entirely about what had been written inside. I kept it very loosely, only writing in it every few months, but it was over a span of three or four years. I closed my eyes and sighed, turned a few pages in and started reading.

_"I knew it was a bad idea to go to Cartman's house, but my mom says it's good to be nice to all the kids in my class, so we went anyway.."_

_ I could hear Cartman yelling from outside, and I looked next to me to see if Clyde still looked up to the task. He was looking at his feet, but when he noticed my gaze, Clyde looked up and forced a smile. His glasses hid his eyes when the sun was glaring off of them like that. I knocked on the door for us and we waited a minute. Two minutes. We stood there long enough that I considered knocking again, but just as I raised my hand, the door opened and Ms. Cartman appeared with a smile._

_ "I'm sorry, kids, Eric has just been a little down today. He's ready for company now, though." She said, moving to the side and letting us enter. _

_ Cartman was a lonely child. He had two friends, neither of which really enjoyed his presence, so his mother was worried, and with reason. He was always so obnoxious, no one really liked the guy. Even at nine-years-old, you can be hated by your peers, as silly as that sounds. People have a way of thinking that kids are just kids, that they don't have social status's, and that they don't discriminate. The reality is that it's as far from the truth as you could possibly get. I would say that children are one of the most judgmental creatures there is, mainly because of their ignorance. They understand so little about diversity that anything different from what they know is unpopular, or wrong. Cartman being raised by one parent was a strange thing, in South Park. His being overweight was also abnormal here. I'd like to say that his annoying behavior came first, but it just wouldn't be true. His behavior was simply the product of being out-casted by everyone for all the abnormalities in his life._

_ Either way, he was seriously annoying, and it took everything I had in me to go over to his house. Clyde was only tagging along because he knew I was uncomfortable, but his awkward quietness almost made me more uncomfortable, because it would only encourage Cartman to be even more unbearable. He feeds off of weakness, I've noticed. We took our time walking in, because we could see him from the door. He was angrily playing video games on the couch, cursing even, which shocked me. I would never cuss in front of my parents. _

_ "Oh, hey guys." He said with a dramatic shift of moods. _

_ He was a brat, but even Cartman knew how to be nice at times. _

_ "Hey dude, what you playing?" I asked, sitting next to him on the couch, and Clyde sitting on the floor next to me, leaning back on the couch._

_ We had a pretty normal conversation for awhile, it was almost pleasant. He had almost made me forget just how irritating he was. It only took one shift in moods, to his mischievous side, that changed my mind._

_ "Hey, you guys wanna go egg Kyle's house?" He asked, with a grin._

_ The abruptness of his question inspired a look of disbelief, which started a problem before I had even realized it._

_ "What? You've never egged a house before?" He asked, his grin turning into a frown._

_ "No, I just don't have a problem with Kyle." I said, returning the annoyed frown._

_ Clyde was just sitting there, not really sure what to say. I looked down at him for support in my decision._

_ "I think it's a bad idea too." He piped softly. _

_ I had hoped for something a little more robust to come from him, but I honestly knew I was wrong to think Clyde would be assertive. I looked at him and smiled with a sigh, and he looked down, knowing my disappointment. I couldn't be too disappointed though, he tried his best and I knew it. _

_ "You guys are squares." He said, scoffing, "Especially you, with your nerdy little glasses."_

_ "Hey, shut up, he didn't do anything to you." I said, defending Clyde._

_ I took his insult too seriously, I knew. I should have just been quiet and let it slide, but I didn't. Now, I knew I was entering a battle with someone who has no reservations about playing dirty. _

_ "What, the little asshole can't defend himself, he needs his big sister to step in?" Cartman bantered angrily. _

_ "No, he's just my friend, and I know he doesn't like conflict. He's afraid of you, because you're a jerk. We wouldn't even be here if my mom didn't make us come over." I said, immediately regretting the brashness of my statement._

_ I knew I hit a sore spot with him, which only meant trouble was on the way. His face turned a bright red and his eyes started watering a little, I had really hurt his feelings. Despite his hard exterior, he was still just a little kid trying to fit in with everyone else. He stood up and snatched Clyde's glasses off of his face, walking away._

_ "I'm not a charity case, if you don't like me, don't come over." He yelled, walking out onto the wooden kitchen floor and dropping Clyde's glasses purposely._

_ Clyde got up desperately and started toward him, but the crunch of his glasses beneath Cartman's foot came before he even reached the edge of the couch. I grimaced at the sound and opened my eyes slowly, to see Clyde frozen in place, still reaching toward the kitchen. I half expected Clyde to cry, or walk away and leave. I really wasn't sure what his reaction would be, really. I'd never seen him faced with something like this before. I heard a slight sob escape him as he stood there for another quiet minute._

_ "Do you realize how pissed my dad is going to be when he finds out my glasses are broken..?" Clyde asked, gritting his teeth to hold back tears._

_ At this point, it was a known fact between Clyde and I that his dad was an abusive drunk. Cartman was still standing there with a proud smile, as if he'd won a prize. Clyde was shaking, but at this point I couldn't tell if he was angry or crying. After a few seconds, he made it more than obvious that it was rage. Clyde walked up to Cartman and grabbed him by the shirt, shaking him._

_ "You have no idea what my dad is going to do to me when he finds out, you fat bastard!" Clyde yelled, shaking Cartman as tears rolled down his face, "He's going to kill me."_

_ I wanted to intervene, but my legs wouldn't move. I had never seen Clyde like this, he was a completely different person. I had never seen him angry, and I never wouldn't have guessed he could be so loud. Cartman may be a "tough guy", but he was all talk, and this kind of attention was something that clearly made him uncomfortable. Clyde had unleashed any pent up anger he had all over Cartman's face. I saw him give at least two good fists to the face, but I was having trouble processing what happened. All I really knew was that Cartman was now in the fetal position on the floor, bawling like a baby. We walked out the door just as his mom came barreling down the stairs. She yelled after us, and I gave an apologetic glance at her as I followed Clyde out the door._

_ Clyde was never the same again after that._

I had forgotten about that day entirely. That was the thing that changed Clyde. The older I got and the more time that passed, I could see that it was that day that made him switch from a quiet person, to the person he was later on. He told something once that helped me make sense of the changes he went through following that event.

"I was holding on to the thought that the rest of the world was okay, but I was wrong."

He never wore glasses again after that day, I saw it as a symbol of accepting things as they are. His faith was thin and frail, and it took that one instance of cruelty to break it. Of course he didn't switch from one person to another in one day, just like that. It took him a few months to a year to reach his full transformation into the person everyone knew to fear. After that day, he spent a lot of time alone at his house, sleeping. He often woke up in the middle of the night and called me, or snuck over to my house. Our parents were such good friends that my mom and dad never turned him away, even at nine or ten at night. Roger and Betsy were like my second parents. Even though Roger was an unbearable drunk by night time, he was a fun guy most of the time. My feelings for Clyde's father were mixed. He was always so nice when everyone was around, but he beat the hell out of Clyde for the most ridiculous things. It was confusing as a kid.

Thinking back on these memories of Clyde was making me feel uncomfortable. Uncomfortable because he was dead, and uncomfortable because it was saddening how short and bad his life was. It felt wrong to feel sorry for someone who caused me so much agony, but it felt as though the person who hurt me and the person I was friends with were two separate entities. In a way, they were two different people. I decided to continue reading, but after a short break. I heard someone enter the house, and I looked out my window to see that it was my dad. He hadn't called or text me, so I suppose he assumed I was asleep. It was eleven at night now, after all. I turned a few more pages in my notebook and started reading.

_"Clyde's party was boy/girl, if my parents knew, I'd never be allowed to go.."_

_ I was only eleven, but I knew that my lack of interest in girls was a little odd, even for my age. Seventh grade was full of dances, clubs and otherwise that were all about dating or meeting peers of the opposite gender. People would be shocked to know just how sexualized the world of junior high really is. It's actually kind of disturbing. Things had progressed to a more adult atmosphere even more quickly, now that Clyde was releasing all of his demons on everyone. Not really in a bullying type way, but in an extremely honest, unaltered way. People usually keep hurtful or inappropriate thoughts to themselves, but anymore, Clyde didn't seem to give a damn what people thought about him. He became cynical, cold, and lately I found that more and more I wanted to keep my distance. His brash and blunt personality mixed with the adult atmosphere he was introduced to early on really made school R-rated. _

_ I was sitting on Clyde's couch. His parents were gone for the weekend and had taken Tonya with them. They figured Clyde was old enough not to get into trouble if they left him alone, but that was a bad judgment call on their part, since he decided to throw a party the first chance he got. It wasn't like Clyde to throw parties, as he didn't really like his peers. Sometimes I wasn't even really sure he liked me. He always acted like he was too grown-up for the things I wanted to do, like play video games or go to the park. I was trying to figure out his motive for the party. I was sitting here, watching all of our classmates mingle and some of them argue, trying to figure out what exactly he was trying to do. The only two kids I noticed weren't here, were Tweek, Butters and the new kid. Bebe, Wendy, and a few other girls were around, but no one was really flirting so far. I heard a few suggestions throughout the hour, but nothing really began._

_ I heard the door open for the hundredth time tonight, and I turned to see the new kid from our class standing in the doorway. I wondered why he was invited, but I wondered even more why he came. So far this year, he hadn't really made any friends, and I didn't really even like him that much. He was quiet, but not a nervous quiet. He just seemed so calm and collected, which just wasn't normal for people our age. Not to mention he had that weird accent, like he moved here from the middle of no where cattle farm. I guess part of me found it intriguing. Really though, the guy was trailer trash, poor as dirt. No one in the class liked him so far, so why is he here?_

_ "Oh hey, you made it. Cool." Clyde said, tossing him a bottle of Sprite, "What's your name again? I'm sorry, I swear I know it, it's just slipping my mind."_

_ "Kenny." The boy said, not taking insult to Clyde's unusual forgetfulness._

_ I wasn't even really doing anything, just sitting and watching everyone. I was brought into a couple of conversations, but aside from that, things were pretty calm for me. After a half hour or so, it was about nine at night and people started getting a little routy. To dispel the rough housing, Stan proposed we play seven minutes in heaven, while awkwardly making a pass at Wendy. Everyone stuck with the idea, and we all drew a picture on a small piece of paper. Girls put their drawings in a party hat and the boys put their pictures in a bowl that Cartman dumped the fruit out of. I chose to draw a telescope with some stars, I felt it was pretty true to my personality. A good hint. _

_ We all sat comfortably in his living room, some on the couch, some on the floor, a couple of girls were even sitting on the counter island between the kitchen and the living room. Clyde was the one leading the game, holding both the bowl and the hat. _

_ "Bebe, draw a piece of paper." He ordered, deciding to smile at the last second to seem less hard._

_ She leaned over from her spot on the floor and pulled out a slip from the bowl, she took her time opening it and when she did, she seemed confused. She turned the paper over and over again, trying to decipher what the object was. _

_ "A.. Well, it looks like a goat with a weird neck." She said awkwardly, looking around and showing the picture to everyone._

_ After a few seconds, Kyle piped up from the other side of the room, "That's uh, that's my giraffe."_

_ Everyone laughed for a second about his crude drawing, and made playfully taunting noises as he walked across the room to Clyde's coat closet. Clyde repeated that there would be exactly seven minutes, then the door would open without warning and you would be exposed entirely. The invasion of privacy was part of the fun. After five minutes, we still couldn't hear anything, but the lack of sound was almost suspicious. Clyde had a pocket watch that he was keeping his eye on ery closely, and after two more minutes, he crept over to the door and yanked it open, without any other sound, earning a gasp from Kyle and Bebe. To our disappointment, they weren't doing anything worth seeing. They were just sitting next to each other, not even holding hands. There were a couple of "boo's" and laughs, but everyone just kind of blew it off and joked around with him about it. Clyde looked around for his next victim._

_ "Token." Clyde said, looking at him, "Your turn."_

_ Token got up, sauntered over and grabbed a piece of paper from the party hat. He knew immediately what it was._

_ "It's a turtle." He said, holding up the picture and earning some giggles from the girls._

_ "Wendy." One of the girls sang, teasingly._

_ Wendy blushed and stood up. Stan appeared as though he was going to stand up and protest, but he knew how well it would play out, so he just put his head in his hands and watched Wendy follow Token into the tiny closet. A few minutes passed and a giggle was heard from inside. I saw a few people exchange glances of anticipation as the time went on. At seven minutes, Clyde yanked open the door, exposing the two of them. Again, there wasn't much to report, but they were definitely holding hands, which is a big deal in junior high. I looked over at Stan to see that he looked sick to his stomach, but also a little angry. He didn't say anything though, since it wasn't really his place. He and Wendy had dated once when they were in fourth grade, and although he's had a thing for her since, nothing ever transpired._

_ "Craig." Clyde said suddenly, and loudly._

_ I knew I would be called on eventually, so I walked over to him as calmly as possible and picked a piece of paper from the party hat. I couldn't really tell what it was, it looked like a circle with a few weird lines drawn next to it. Or an oval. A badly drawn one. _

_ "Hm, um, an oval or a circle? With lines?" I asked, holding up the paper, confused._

_ I looked at Clyde, it took him a minute to realize what was going on, but when he did, he seemed angry and confused. I could tell by the look on his face that this was his drawing, and that it wasn't meant to end up in the mix with the girls. I could see that he was debating on staying quiet, or calling someone out on it. Since it was his idea to use the bowl for the males and the hat for the females, he knew very well which one was which. This was most likely the doing of someone at the party who wanted to rattle his cage, and I could tell that he knew that._

_ "Whoever thought it was funny to put my drawing in with the girls, speak up now." He said, threateningly. _

_ No one came forward, but I could see the tone of the party turn from fun into fear in a matter of seconds. He waited for a few minutes, knowing that whoever did it was probably not going to come forward. I knew he was thinking of some plot, a way to punish everyone if the person didn't come forward. It wasn't like him to let things go unsettled, and he wasn't about to start now._

_ "I can sit here all night, but I'm not about to. I'll tell every single one of your parents about this party if the person doesn't speak up. I don't care if mine find out, I've lived through worse." He said, taking a seat on the couch and crossing his legs, comfortably. He was prepared for a waiting game and everyone knew it._

_ "It.. It was Cartman. He was showing off to Token, I saw it." Pip said from the back of the crowd, earning some stares._

_ Everyone shifted their view to Clyde again, waiting to see if he found it believable. Clyde looked to Token, earning a nod. Cartman gave a light protest, but his fear of Clyde shut him up quickly. _

_ "Do you think I'm a fag, Cartman? Is that what you're trying to say?" He asked loudy and accusingly, "Or are you implying that I'm a girl?"_

_ He was quiet. I couldn't see him from where I was sitting, but I could imagine that he was staring at his feet._

_ "Everyone, get out." Clyde said harshly, "Except you, lard ass."_

_ Everyone nearly single-filed out the door as soon as he said we could leave. It was almost like being in trouble as a class and the teacher telling everyone they can go home after being lectured. I almost felt like I had done something wrong, he was so good at seeming omniscient. It was like he knew every which way to make people feel uncomfortable, and did so on numerous occasions. I think the biggest reason everyone feared him, a valid one, was because he always followed through with his threats. If Clyde said he was going to kick your ass, he was going to. If he said he blackmails you and you don't do the desired thing, he will use the blackmail against you. He doesn't back down. On my way out the door, I caught Kenny as he was walking past me. I figured this was a bad first party for him in this town, even if he didn't know anyone anyway._

_ "Uh, hey. I promise things aren't always like this." I said as he turned toward me, "And you're welcome to hang with me if you want, I think I"m done being friends with Clyde."_

_ I didn't realize I had made up my mind until he left my mouth. I had been debating on breaking off my friendship with Clyde for a long time. Part of me feared how he would react, the other part of me figured he really didn't care either way. I had outlived my usefulness to him, he didn't really benefit from me anymore, so I assumed he didn't value our friendship. That was my main reason for wanting to cut ties, along with the fact that he was constantly threatening everyone all the time, but I could live with that if I thought he cared about our friendship at all. What he really valued is having control in my life. I'd made up my mind, though. I was done being his friend._

After that night, he and I didn't talk again for awhile. It was never really discussed, just understood. Not to say he didn't act out toward me, especially when he saw that I had made friends with the freaky new kid. I knew though, however, that he wasn't jealous because he wanted my friendship. He was jealous because he felt like someone was taking away something that was his. He was possessive that way, for all the wrong reasons. Valuing someone's friendship so much that you're afraid to lose them is one thing, but believing you have ownership over them, or that you have some kind of unprecedented right to be in their life is another. Either way, after that night, he had become somewhat of an enemy to me. To everyone, really. The only people that stuck around were the ones he had power over.

The class males split off into three groups. Clyde's group, my group, and the group of kids that no one really paid attention to. The night Mary died, the only connection between the two parties was Stan, who maintained a neutral relationship between everyone. Stan wanted to have a bon fire for his thirteenth birthday, since he's the oldest out of all of us, technically. He had invited some guys from both parties, and told us we could bring our siblings. Since Mary and Tonya were best friends, my mom thought it would be a good idea to have them tag along to hang out, my parents knew I was responsible and that I'd never do anything illegal. The intention was to just have a normal, fun bonfire. Since my house was just a few blocks away, they figured I would just go home if I got uncomfortable. The idea that I would be incapacitated, hit with a shovel, had never crossed their mind.

I closed my notebook and set it down on my bed. I realized now that the piece of paper I found in the box, the one with a bad circle and lines, it was a rock with grass. Clyde had drawn a rock, like when we had first met. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath and felt the corners of my mouth begin to bend downward without my control. The stinging in my nose told me I was about to cry, but I grit my teeth and tried to stop it. Only a couple of tears escaped my eyes before I felt the calm release. It's been a long time since all of these things took place, but to me, it felt like I was still living it. Some days the past seems far away, but other times, it seems very, very close.

I could hear my father pacing downstairs, if I listened closely. After a few minutes, I heard our front door open and shut, and I wondered if he had left again until I heard voices. I couldn't tell what they were saying, but it sounded like an argument they were trying to keep quiet so no one could hear them. I could make out a few things, though.

"You should have never moved back, Pete." Was one of the things I did hear.

Recognizing a voice, but being unable to place a name to it made me curious. I crept as quietly as I could and opened my door without a sound. I slid down the hall, avoiding the spots in the floor that I knew would make noise, and I stood by the stairs. I waited for a few seconds to hear the conversation, but nothing was being said. I started to feel like they knew I was listening, but the conversation resumed.

"My son is dead, Pete." I heard Roger's voice say, shakily, "This wasn't supposed to happen. How am I supposed to sleep at night knowing that the person who helped murder my son is down the street? How, Pete?"

I heard my dad say in a raspy voice, "My daughter is dead. Move to Florida; I did. Start a new life with a son who doesn't remember you. I did. Do the best you god damn can, like I did. You think you have trouble sleeping? Well, you might have trouble sleeping, but you can go into Tonya's bedroom and watch her sleep. Any night of the week, can't you? And she'll love you and remember who you are." The bitterness in his voice shocked me, "Your son and his friends took both of my children from me. Both of them. Just because Craig wasn't dead, didn't mean he was there."

His recollection of the event seemed so unlike how he acted back then. When I was in Florida, he acted like everything was fine, and so did my mother. I still didn't understand why they cose to hide her from me, from everyone. They acted like she was never even born.

"When they find the body, what if they find evidence, Pete?" Roger asked my dad, quietly.

"When they find her, I don't think they'll be able to prove anything. At the very least, they won't be able to prove we had any part of this thing." I heard my father say.

I gasped a bit, my mouth was gaping open, but I covered it quickly after.

"I.. I'm going home to my daughter." Roger spat quietly, and the next thing I heard was the door closing.

My father had just openly admitted to being a part of my sister's death, and I wasn't sure how to go about handling things. I knew for sure that I had to ask what he meant when he said that to Pete. At the very least, a lie would bring comfort. At the most, he would provide a logical explanation for saying something that would indicate he helped kill her. Assuming there can be a good reason for that. The father I knew, that I grew up with, would never hurt a fly. That fact alone made it clear that I had to confront him about it. I worked up my nerve and started down the stairs.

The further I got down the stairs, I noticed a soft sobbing. Regardless of my father's involvement, what he was feeling was very real. I continued down the stairs and turned to corner toward the kitchen. Hearing me coming, he lifted his head from the kitchen table, wiped his face and cleared his throat. It was like him to pretend that nothing was wrong. From when I was a child to now, I had only seen him cry two times, neither of which I could understand the meaning of. Now, however, I knew the reason.

"Hey dad, who was here?" I asked, testing the water.

He sighed and faced me with blood-shot eyes, "Just Roger. He's pretty upset."

I looked at my feet, "I couldn't help but overhear your conversation.. And I have a couple of questions."

Getting straight to the point was the best policy in this situation, I knew. My dad looked down, then turned and gestured to the chair across the table from him. I was afraid to ask the questions I needed the answers to the most, but I knew that to clear the air, I had to.

"I overheard you say you were involved in her death." I left it at that, to see what he would say.

He sighed and put his hands on his face in discomfort, "It's not like that, Craig. It's not."

I remained quiet and waited for him to continue, feeling extremely uncomfortable by how nervous he looked. This was something he had kept a secret for years, I could tell. It was something he felt he would take to the grave. I was walking on information he didn't want anyone to know, but he knew that leaving me unanswered would only result in the use of my imagination to fill in the blanks.

"Roger came to the hospital looking for me later that night, after we'd been called there by the doctor." He started, appearing to give up the fight of keeping secrets, "He was desperate, but he knew he couldn't talk to me about it there. He knew I would be irate, destroyed. He knew I would be yelling and carrying on like hell, which I did after he brought me back to his house after he told me what happened. Clyde told him it was an accident. Things got out of hand, and you had strangled Mary in an argument. I was ignorant, Craig. I believed him."

I waited for him to go on.

"So he told me we should bury her somewhere that no one would ever find her, but when we went back, a couple of the kids were still there. Stan and Kenny were standing by her, in shock, and we couldn't get them to leave." He explained, "So we took her, we wrapped her in a tarp, and weighed her down with a few boulders.. And we laid her at the bottom of Starke's pond."

After finishing his last sentence, he was reduced to a sniveling heap on the table.

"H-How do you do that to your little girl..?" He asked through sobs, making my eyes tear up along with his. He paused, and said with a sting, "And then I find out I didn't even do it for you."

He did it because he thought I had killed her. This entire time, he was protecting me, because he was told a lie. All the secrets, the lies, the conversations behind closed doors, they were all because he thought I had murdered my sister and he was trying to save me. He moved me away, hid me, sheltered me, and all this time, I thought my life was normal. I thought they knew me, but all along, they had been raising me as a murderer and not who I am in reality. Everything they've said to me, the time they spent with me, it had all been done with a hint of doubt in my character. This whole time.

As it was, I had no idea what to say to my father right now. After all the history we had together, knowing he had doubted me this entire time had made me see him as somewhat of a stranger. I guess it was mainly a disappointment in his lack of faith in me. Imagine you're accused of robbing a bank, but you didn't. Everyone is telling you they believe you, but the whole time, they're keeping an eye on you without you realizing it. It's a shitty feeling, simple as that.

Deciding I didn't have anything more to ask, or say, I turned and walked to the stairs. I wasn't angry, but at this very second, I had no desire to talk to him right now. As I walked up the stairs, I heard the handle of our front door turn, and I looked toward it. It glided open, and the instant I saw his orange sleeve, I knew who it was. I'd like to say I ran down the stairs and hugged him. I'd like to, but I didn't. I stood there, watching him come in, unsure of what to say. Our relationship seemed so different since the bon fire, but that's to be expected, since I held a gun to his head. Since I found out he was a part of my sister's sexual assault, even if it was involuntary. Not to mention, I hadn't expected him to return to this home, I assumed he would return to his family home after something this serious happened.

He walked in and closed the door. He noticed me on the stairs, and we looked at each other. We stood there for a long time, just looking at each other without a sound. I wanted so badly to know what he was thinking right now. I wondered if he was angry with me, or if he still felt the same about me as he did before this mess happened, but more so, I wanted to know how he was feeling. It had been a long couple of days, and I knew he was feeling bad.

He blinked, looked at his feet and stood there for another minute or so before walking toward me. He walked up the first step and the second step, stopping a step below the one I was on. It was a shock to my system when I felt his tiny frame pressed against mine, his arms wrapped around my waist. It took me a long second to finally wrap my arms around his shoulders, but when I did, he flinched slightly. It was so confusing, the way I felt. Right now, it felt like I didn't know anyone, and I was certain that Kenny felt the same way right now. It was the feeling of having no one to turn to, but even when he felt that way, he turned to me.

I knew this was the start of something new and free for us, we had a future without the harassment of Clyde, without the haunting memory of Mary. We would have to live with what happened to us, but the difference is that is was out in the open, now. Everything had been set free, including Mary. Despite the discomfort, he and I went up to my room, crawled into my bed, and slept next to each other without a word that night.

After that, Mary's body was successfully recovered, with no trace of my father's involvement. A part of me wanted to tell them what he had said, but he had protected me, so I protected him. The fact his protection was unnecessary was disregarded, since it was his intention that truly counted. My mother returned home a few short days later, and after my father explained to her his involvement, and the truth of what happened, she locked herself in their bedroom for days without eating. To my relief, she emerged seeming perfectly healthy after that, and resumed her life as normally as possible.

Stan had received a sentence of twenty-five to life in prison, which broke everyone's spirit, including mine. Eric Cartman, Token Black and Tweek Tweak got off entirely free, but in the months after Stan's sentencing, Cartman was found dead in his bedroom, having hung himself. His life had been hard and long, and despite the negative vibe around suicide, I knew that compared to his inner demons, it was likely a peaceful way to go. His mother was distraught, and became a heavy alcoholic after his death. No one in town talks about her, aside from a few worried whispers.

Kenny and I graduated that year, and we decided to move far from the wintery town of South Park. We wanted to go somewhere warmer, but we ended up in Georgia, which was mild for most of the year. Kenny and I ended up doing rather well. I'm currently going to a small community college, and Kenny is working as a construction manager. We had a small, two bedroom house on the side of a lake. The water often haunts me, especially when the weather is cold, but I keep that to myself. There's no sense in worrying Kenny. My mother was worried about me, and she was sad to see me go, but she knew that it was in my best interest to leave. South Park is a black hole, a grave site. There was nothing there left for me.

Kenny's mother sent pictures all the time. After we left, Kenny's parents and mine became rather close. Kenny's mom had her baby, a boy, and named him David. According to Mrs. McCormick, my mother had been especially involved in David's life, and helped them out often. Kenny's mom was happy to have her around, as it had been hard for them to raise a child in the financial situation they had. I guess my mom didn't know how to live without taking care of someone. She really is a beautiful person, my mom. Almost magical, or angelic.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Some days, the past seems very distant, as if it never happened. Other days, it feels like just yesterday I was walking with Mary and Lucy around South Park, watching her catch snowflakes on her tongue. The other day at the small market, I swear I got a glance of Clyde looking in at us while we shopped, and nearly threw up. I have a lot of recovering to do, yet, as did Kenny. Sometimes when I walk down the street here, I feel like everyone knows my history, as if it's written on my face in large, scarlet letters. I tried my hardest to bury those thoughts, along with the past. Our life together was going to be long and happy, I knew. Even if plagued by the memory of something horrible that happened up in that little town by the mountains.

**Author's note: Thank you for reading. I decided to end this story early, so consider it an early Christmas present. This is the final chapter of Snow, and it was much longer than I had intended it to be. If you have any questions about details, the plot or otherwise, I encourage you to message me, because I will answer them. If you like my fanfiction, I really appreciate reviews, because it helps me keep writing. If you have any suggestions for me in the future, please private message me. I love constructive criticism. Happy Holidays.**

**Localism.**


End file.
